When Turnout Leads to Turnaround

There's still some pumpkin pie left in the fridge, but the "best and worst" lists of the year already are trickling out.

The first of these I've seen on the education front comes from the Hoover Institution, a conservative-leaning think tank at Stanford University.

The group's Top 10 education events of 2011 include "the reinvigoration of school choice via opportunity scholarships and vouchers" (good) and the Atlanta cheating scandal (bad).

I think most of us would agree that cheating -- especially when it involves collusion by dozens of teachers, principals and administrators -- is a bad thing. However, some of the other items on the Hoover Institution's list are more open to debate.

On the think tank's "good" list is the California State Board of Education's rule that would force a public school to convert to a charter school (or undergo some other "transformational remedy") if more than half of the school's parents request it.

Frankly, getting that many parents to sign a petition for just about anything should be considered some sort of victory.

Often, a small -- yet vocal -- minority makes the decisions on behalf of parents who are either too busy, or too disengaged, to participate in the process.

A few years ago I wrote about Las Vegas' public schools planning to adopt stricter dress codes -- typically tan or navy skirts and pants, worn with solid colored collared shirts. The Clark County School District called this "standard student attire," which is obviously a lot less scary to parents than "uniform." (The semantics still weren't enough of a red herring to dissuade the ACLU from challenging the policy.)

The Clark County School District's policy required that majority of parents surveyed had to be in favor of the change. But the policy didn't set a minimum requirement for how many surveys actually had to be returned.

At one elementary school with over 800 students, just 24 surveys were returned, with 70 percent in favor of adopting the stricter dress code. A middle school, with over 1,500 students, also switched to the stricter dress code after getting 75 surveys, with the majority in favor of the policy change.

For more on California's "parent trigger" rules, check out a recent editorial from the Los Angeles Times (click here for the link).

According to the reporting, a Compton elementary school was the first test of the policy, and the community was soon embroiled in the "stuff of high educational drama — claims of intimidation from both sides, an intransigent school board that put parents through ridiculous hoops to verify their signatures and, eventually, legal defeat when the petition was found lacking on largely technical grounds."

Even if the Compton test case was messy, the new policy seems to be having a positive effect in unexpected ways. The L.A. Times reports that throughout the state parents are forming advocacy groups aimed at improving their own public schools.

While it might not be as quick as pulling a trigger, that kind of engagement can lead to real reform.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Chicago Teachers Speak Up On Using Student Test Scores in Evaluations

The teachers union in the nation's third-largest school district have concerns about using student test scores as a measure of an educator's effectiveness, according to this story from the Chicago Tribune. It's worth noting (again, and even again) that there is no consensus among researchers as to the best way to factor in standardized test data when it comes to teacher evaluations. Many districts and states are moving at high speed toward using student data as a factor in evaluating teachers, in part because of federal incentives that offer desperately needed funding in exchange for pledges to reform. In case you missed it, the National Council on Teacher Quality has a new report detailing just how fast that reform train is moving. (You can find the link here.)

NCTQ is also taking issue with Florida's plan to use schoolwide (rather than individual classroom) student reading scores to evaluate teachers, even those who are responsible for separate subjects such as math. For more on that issue, I suggest you read an excellent piece from the Hechinger Report (click here for the link).

In a blog post about the Florida policy and the Hechinger story, NCTQ says "It's non-sensical decisions like this one that play right into the hands of the anti-test, (Diane) Ravitch crowd."

Have a question, comment concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter at EWAEmily.

UC Davis: Still Paying for Pepper Spraying Students

So, the UC Davis students who were pepper sprayed by a campus officer will have their medical bills covered by the university. (Click here for the link to the Slate.com story.) I have a feeling the university will be paying for this episode long after the last medical bill is resolved.  

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Schools Sell Advertising to Close Budget Gaps

I spent more years than I care to remember working both Thanksgiving and the dreaded "Black Friday." It's the shopping season kickoff that supposedly sets the tone for the retail season.

Businesses might love it, but most reporters hate it. People are generally grouchy because they had to get up early on a holiday and schlep to the mall. Being interviewed about their shopping habits isn't at the top of their list.

Participating in Black Friday -- and covering it -- has become much safer, now that the big box stores have largely abandoned the strategy of encouraging hundreds of people to sleep on the sidewalk, and then fight their way inside for the bargains.

The business of schooling is all about money these days, and in that spirit, I offer a few stories of public schools anxious to make some sales.

In Jefferson County, Colo., education officials will be selling advertising space ... on student report cards (click here for the link to the local CBS affiliate's report).

In Jordan, Utah, the local district is first to take advantage of a new state law allowing advertisements on school buses.

What's the policy in your district? If states and local communities are unable to properly fund schools, is advertising really the answer?

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org.

Happy Thanksgiving!

I'm taking a day off from blogging to think about all the things I have to be grateful for, and it's a lengthy list.

See you tomorrow!  

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

UC Davis Students' Silent Protest

By now you've probably seen the video of Linda Katehi, the University of California, Davis chancellor, and her long, long walk to her car through a crowd of students.

Many people in the UC community (and elsewhere) are angry that a campus police officer used pepper spray on apparently nonviolent participants in an Occupy Wall Street-inspired protest.

As Katehi makes her way through the crowd, she is flanked on either side by students seated on the ground. There is no chanting. There is no yelling. There is only a chilling quiet.

After a friend of mine watched the video, she summed it up nicely: Sometimes silence can be the loudest voice of all.

On a related note, ZDNet.com's Zach Whittaker tracks how the plethora of cell phone videos of the incident poked holes in the official response. (Thanks to Poynter's MediaWire for drawing attention to the link.)

I have to wonder what students at Penn State thought when they saw their West Coast peers in action. The Penn riots in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky scandal were shameful. Sadly, it was also far from the first episodes of senseless destruction at the campus.

I'll have more on that side of the story next week, including an interview with Lexi Belculfine, editor-in-chief of the Daily Collegian, Penn State's student-run newspaper.

In the meantime, if you are traveling for Thanksgiving, I hope your planes, trains and automobiles get you safely where you need to go. By popular request, I'll be tweeting my "Travels with Archie", and you are welcome to follow along.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Should It Pay to Drop Out of Law School?

Over on Slate.com, two Yale law professors are urging their school to pay students to give up their pursuit of the profession. Too many students are graduating with enormous debt they have little chance of ever repaying -- and the law schools know it, the professors say.

The Slate opinion piece makes some interesting arguments, including looking to Zappos.com for inspiration. The professors note that after the online shopping behemoth finishes training new employees, the company offers them $3,000 to quit. This pitch helps them weed out workers who are more interested in the short-term payoff than building a long-term career with the company. Law schools would be wise to employ a similar "loyalty" test, according to the Slate piece.

(Full disclosure: The Zappos headquarters used to be next door to my office at the Las Vegas Sun. When they had their frequent costume parades in the parking lot or the gourmet burger truck paid a call, my colleagues and I would gather at our windows to heckle their happy-workplace doings.)

In addition to their innovative suggestions for thinning the herd, Professors Akhil Reed Amar and Ian Ayres believe that for students who received federal loans, law schools should publish the salaries of graduates for the first 10 years of their careers. Doing so will give prospective students more realistic expectations for their own income trajectories, the professors argue.

Their position echoes a recurring theme in the current debate over the future of higher education: Students are consumers, and there needs to be more transparency as to exactly what you "buy" when you pursue a college or graduate degree. I would say that's the case for all professional programs, not just the aspiring lawyers.

For another take on the challenges of a legal education, check out this New York Times piece over the weekend about how law schools are leaving it up to the firms to teach their new hires the actual business of "lawyering".

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Private Money for Public Schools: A Good Read From the New Yorker

We hear a lot about the need for more community involvement in schools, and the New Yorker has a thoughtful blog post on the influence of private money in public education.

Writer Matthew McKnight looks at the support the Knowledge is Power Program (KIPP) charter school network receives from private donors such as the Walton Family Foundation. McKnight notes, correctly, that there's no realistic way to scale KIPP to serve as many students who might benefit from the program, which has a remarkable academic track record.

McKnight writes that "economic inequality reverberates through the American educational system ... The Walton Family Foundation donation aims to increase capacity, which may end up being wonderful for future K.I.P.P. students. But what is America to do with the other children?"

When I read stories like this, I think about Horace Mann's reports to the Massachusetts State Board of Education back in the 1830's and 1840's. He wrote in one report that he disliked "private academies" because they had the potential to siphon off the most talented students and their engaged and interested parents. Mann also believed that a strong system of public schools was the cornerstone of the (relatively) young Republic, and that successful individuals had an obligation to support those efforts.

While we're on the subject of public-private partnerships, I suggest you take a look at Communities in Schools. If you're not already familiar with the organization, you should be. Chances are the group is at work in your state, if not your local district.

A huge element of the federal Investment in Innovation Fund (known as the I3 program) is finding community support for educational endeavors. The list of top-ranked applicants was recently posted. Check here to see if a team in your area made the list.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Alabama's Immigration Law Hurts Students, Says CAP

The Center for American Progress has a feisty take on Alabama's new immigration law, and 10 reasons why it's bad for students ... and the state. The points raised by CAP should certainly resonate in other communities considering similar preemptive education policies.

This can be a tough story for K-12 journalists to tackle -- if you do find a family willing to cooperate and talk about the challenges of being undocumented immigrants with children in a public school system, you usually have to provide anonymity or agree to hold back certain descriptive details.

There have been some excellent examples of college-age students stepping out of the shadows in an effort to bolster the DREAM Act. (Check out this one about Bernard Pastor of Cincinnati, and, just last week, this San Antonio Express-News story about Texas' Benita Veliz.)

But typically those individuals intentionally find the media, rather than the other way around.

For a bigger picture view of the potential benefits of educating undocumented students, check out this Inside Higher Ed commentary by Ronald Trowbridge, a research fellow at the Center for College Productivity and Affordability.

One side note, I'm curious how many of the people who agree with Trowbridge's piece might also have a problem with its headline: Educated Illegal Immigrants Bring Fiscal Gain. I notice the phrase "illegal immigrants" is also used on the CCPA's web site. For more on the debate over "illegal" versus "undocumented", consider NPR's thoughtful piece from last December.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Immersion Education: Louisiana Students Say Bonjour to French

I wanted to offer a couple of idea for stories to the education writers and reporters who read this blog, starting with a lovely piece out of Louisiana. Associated Press writer Stacey Plaisance found out there's a waiting list at all 29 of the state's schools offering immersion language instruction -- in French.

I've visited immersion schools, which typically offer instruction for half of the academic day in English, and the other half in a foreign language. Spanish is obviously one of the more popular, followed closely by Mandarin. The half-day policy typically extends from the front office to the playground. (For a primer on immersion education, click here.)

How popular are the immersion schools in your area? Are any unusual languages being considered, such as Arabic? What sort of community support are the schools receiving international organizations and civic groups?

If you're looking for background on French immersion schools specifically, start with the Association of French Schools in North America. For more on the research supporting the benefits of immersion education, take a look at this brief from the American Educational Research Association. The Center for Applied Linguistics also has a useful online resource explaining what parents should know about immersion education.

Now for today's question: If you could start learning a foreign language today, what would be it be, and why? I'd like to learn Turkish, so that the next time I'm in Istanbul I can talk with students as comfortably as they conversed with me in English.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Evaluating Teachers: EWA Seminar Sparks Debate

We had nearly 50 education journalists in Chicago for a one-day EWA seminar on "Evaluating Teachers: Beyond the Rhetoric." I encourage you to read some of the terrific work being done this week by the seminar participants, including the Kalamazoo Gazette's Julie Mack and Dave Murray of the Grand Rapids Press. Mack cleverly organized some of the lessons from the seminar into "10 things to think about as Michigan and other states overhaul teacher evaluations." Her summary is both thoughtful and engaging.

Dave Murray reported on one of the more controversial remarks made at Saturday's event, by Tim Knowles, the John Dewey director of the University of Chicago Urban Education Institute. Knowles suggested that schools of education amounted to a "cartel," which can effectively avoid outside attempts to change how they prepare students for teaching careers.

Teacher prep programs are under intense scrutiny right now, and I think we should expect to see many stories in regional publications in the coming months, looking at the track records of specific programs.

We also had a chance to hear from researchers from the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research about a new report examining teacher evaluations as a means of actually helping educators improve their performance, rather than just rating them. (To read the report, click here.) You can also read Rebecca Vevea's story from the Chicago News Cooperative, to find out how Windy City teachers feel about proposed changes to evaluation systems.

For a roundup of additional stories, check out this entry on Ed Beat, which is being updated as new pieces are published.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

CNN's New Ed Blog, Rick Perry's Brain Freeze and the Penn State Scandal

There's a new blog in town -- CNN has launched "Schools of Thought", and it intends to share perspectives on education from a wide range of voices.

Donna Krache, the blog's editor, is a parent and a former teacher. In her welcome post she writes that "a student’s educational experience often includes those life lessons that aren’t components of the curriculum ... they also learn about life from challenges that they might face daily, such as relationships, family problems, bullying and financial concerns. There are teachable moments and opportunities for learning there as well."

Krache is interested in hearing from you. Send your thoughts and story ideas to SchoolsOfThought@cnn.com.

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The Associated Press' Kimberly Hefling has a story this week about Republican presidential candidates who say they would limit (or even eliminate) the federal role in public education. You might wonder if some of them are rethinking those plans, after Texas Gov. Rick Perry's "oops" moment during last week's debate. As my colleague Alexander Russo pointed out on his blog, Perry's brain freeze (just seconds after threatening to eliminate the U.S. Department of Education) suggests a sort of karmic retribution.

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While we're on the topic of the Ed Feds, the department will investigate whether officials at Penn State failed to properly report a suspected case of "sex offenses" on campus, according to a press release on its web site.

It was gratifying to see the Penn State community gather for a candlelight vigil in honor of the victims of sexual abuse. I just wish it could have come ahead of (and possibly forestalled) the student riots.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Evaluating Teachers: Lessons From the EWA Seminar

Over the weekend, EWA hosted a one-day seminar at the University of Chicago on the subject of "Evaluating Teachers: Beyond the Rhetoric." I can tell you the sessions were engaging, thoughtful and thought-provoking.

One of the reoccurring themes we heard from teachers (and their advocates) at the seminar was that they welcomed evaluations, if the intent was to actually help them improve at their work. What policymakers should be worried about is whether the evaluation models "improve instruction ... not just `did we rate them well,'" said Rob Weil, director of field programs in the educational issues department of the American Federation of Teachers.

The idea that you can identify teachers who are falling short "and nature will take its course" and people will improve on their own "doesn't happen," Weil said. "You have to help." When teachers are presented with an evaluation system that actually works toward that larger goal, "teachers embrace it," Weil said. He also added that people do seem to be talking about how to use evaluations to improve classroom instruction, rather than simply teachers into groups by performance labels. As a result, "I'm more optimistic than I've been in a few years," Weil said.

Also at the seminar, Tim Knowles, the John Dewey director of the University of Chicago Urban Education Institute made some provocative points in his remarks. He noted that federal standards deem teachers to be "highly qualified" once they pass a national certification exam. That's far different from examining an individual's actual effectiveness in the classroom. While evaluations and accountability are important, it's only part of the larger picture, Knowles said.

In the discussion of teacher evaluations, Knowles warned against building systems that don't actually help individuals move to the next level, or define teacher quality only in relation to student results. The reality is that teachers are part of a complex organization, and those who work in "healthy" organizations are more likely to perform well and stay in the profession, Knowles said. Schoolhouses need to be interesting places to work for the teachers as well as the students, Knowles said.

I'm going to share more of the seminar with you in future blog postings. In preparation for that, I have a question for you: Do you believe teacher evaluation scores, listing individuals by name, should be made public, as was the case in the Los Angeles Times "Grading the Teachers" project?

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

The Pressure to Cheat: Greater Than Ever in LA, Teachers Say

For the most part, when we talk about teacher evaluations, it's in the abstract. We debate methodologies and models, and question issues of fairness and equity. the L.A. Times story is a good reminder that we're also talking about human beings.

The Los Angeles Times has a story reporting fears that the emphasis on student test scores will make some teachers more likely to cheat. That's apparently not a revolutionary point of view. I had a chance to chat with Robert Schaeffer, public education director for Fair Test -- an advocacy group that pushes for appropriate use of standardized tests -- about some of these issues.

The "explosion of test cheating reports" were unavoidable in the wake of NCLB's stringent demands for student achievement data, Schaeffer says. Schaeffer quoted Campbell's Law: “The more any quantitative social indicator is used for social decision-making, the more subject it will be to corruption pressures and the more apt it will be to distort and corrupt the social processes it is intended to monitor.” If nothing else, Schaeffer says, the recent cheating scandals "have again demonstrated that overreliance on standardized test scores is a flawed strategy for creating lasting educational reform."

The type of cheating the L.A. Times' story is talking about -- individual teachers taking actoin to save their own jobs -- is a far cry from the kind of high-level, orchestrated collusion that's alleged in places like Atlanta. But there's little doubt that the pressure is higher than ever. I'll be at the University of Chicago tomorrow for an EWA seminar on teacher evaluations -- we're bringing together researchers, educators (including classroom teachers), union leaders and policymakers to talk about this important and contentious topic. I look forward to sharing some of the discussion with you next week.  

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Mid-Week Roundup: Undocumented Students, Head Start and the Penn State Scandal

U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan spoke in support of letting undocumented students pay in-state college tuition, pointing to Rhode Island as an example of a state on the right track. (Read more about the Ocean State and the DREAM Act here.)

When it comes to immigration issues, new policies -- however well intentioned -- don't come without significant consequences. Esther Cepeda, a Washington Post columnist, had a provocative piece calling the California Dream Act both misleading and potentially risky for immigrants. You can read her column here.

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President Obama is calling for more oversight and stricter standards for federal Head Start programs, according to this story from the Philadelphia Enquirer. (I wrote about the recent push for more innovative -- and successful -- early childhood programs in a prior blog post. You can find it here.)

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The Daily Collegian is producing some strong work on its coverage of the alleged sex abuse scandal at Penn State.

The student newspaper has had numerous stories about the charges against former Penn State Football defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky, and the effect of the scandal on campus life. That's included a piece looking into the disappearance of "Sandusky Blitz" ice cream from the campus creamery (Click here for a link to the Daily Collegian's web site).

These can be murky waters for even veteran journalists, and the campus reporters seem to be more than holding their own.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

News Site Demonstrates Community Journalism With Database on School Vaccination Rates

I was completely shocked by a piece on the AtlanticWire about the unbelievably low vaccination rate at a Bay Area private school. (I found the story through Slate.com's XX Factor.) More than three-quarters of the kindergarteners at the Waldorf School of the Peninsula are not vaccinated.

Megan McArdle of the AtlanticWire points out that even if the unvaccinated children themselves never become ill, they are potential carriers of potentially deadly infectious diseases, including measles and polio. That means they could transmit the disease to someone with a compromised immune system.

One of the more amazing aspects of this story is the source of the vaccination statistics -- it's the Bay Citizen, a news start-up in its second year of operation. As the news site explains, the Bay Citizen is a "nonprofit, nonpartisan, member-supported news organization dedicated to promoting innovation in journalism and catalyzing citizen engagement with the news."

The interactive database on school immunization rates is a superb example of community journalism. (Click here for the link.)

I have been wondering what the reaction was to the database among local schools, both public and private, and I plan to follow up with the Bay Citizen staff. I am also curious about what prompted the decision to create the database, how difficult it was to set up and how many "hits" it has received. I am also going to reach out the Waldorf School of the Peninsula for a response.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Higher Ed Spotlight: Community College Access, Accountability

We spent the weekend at UCLA for EWA's Higher Education Seminar for journalists, and one of the most immediately useful sessions might have been with one of our keynote speakers, Inside Higher Ed co-founder and editor Scott Jaschik.

His talk was entitled "Ten Higher Education Stories You Should Cover This Year," and that's exactly what he gave us. Seriously, Jaschik laid put a blueprint that would keep an assignment editor happy for months.

I'm not going to provide the full list here (hey, attendance at EWA events has its benefits!). But with Jaschik's permission I will share one of his pointers, in part because it reflects themes we heard again and again over the course of the two days of panels and workshops.

Community colleges are undergoing both radical change and renewed scrutiny, Jashik says, and they deserve front-burner attention from education writers and reporters. He noted that policymakers are suddenly looking for actual evidence of effectiveness. As a result, governing boards are facing a new level of scrutiny and higher expectations. (Check out this story from the Baltimore Sun for just one example.)

Once the open-access entry point to higher education, community college systems are struggling with a huge influx of non-traditional students. Many of them are working adults looking for short-term certification programs in order to find new careers or hold on to the ones they have. At the same time, community colleges are being flooded with students from four-year universities who find themselves shut out of over-subscribed basic classes at their own campuses.

As a result, there is a new element of tension for community college administrators. In California, a task force assembled to address these issues had some notable recommendations. Among them: community colleges should severely restrict the number of majors that are offered; that students should be required to complete a long-term academic plan before beginning their studies; and students should be required to complete any remedial classes at the start of their studies.

We seem to be skating perilously close to what I would call academic triage. With the shortage of seats, it makes sense for higher education institutions at all levels to try and focus resources on students who are to most likely to benefit But how does that fit with the open-access mission that has been the defining hallmark of community colleges?

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I am also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Reading List: Chicago Sun-Times, Slate and EWA Higher Ed Seminar

I've been traveling quite a bit the past few days, and that's let me catch up on some overdue reading (keeping track of the multitude of education stories and blogs could be a fulltime job).

One story I've been meaning to share comes from the Chicago Sun-Times, about top-performing schools having longer instructional days (click here for the link).

Is anyone really surprised that more time on task might have something to do with higher achievement?

Speaking of time on task, I'm at UCLA for the next few days for EWA's Higher Education Seminar. It's going to be a full schedule, as you can see from the agenda.

Today I'll be moderating a panel discussion on "When Getting a Job Means Getting a Degree." I look forward to sharing some of the highlights with you.

In the meantime, if you want a truly terrific read about the relationship between education and employment, try this: Paul Lukas' exceptional series for Slate.com, about the Manhattan Trade School for Girls. (Click here for the link.)

In 1996, he stumbled onto an abandoned (and nearly trashed) file cabinet of report cards that dated back to the 1920's and even earlier. The stories and history he relates explain how and why trade schools were valued at the time as a key component of anti-poverty campaigns. His efforts to track down the former students are also a valuable lesson in enterprise journalism.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

Center on Education Policy Report Tackles School Turnaround

There is a valuable report out today from the Center on Education Policy, looking at school district perceptions of a new federal grant program intended to help the lowest-performing campuses. (Click here for the link.)

One of the often-repeated phrases in education reform circles is that it takes about three years for seeds to bear fruit. In the new CEP report, most of the educators surveyed said that's not enough time to turn around the lowest-achieving high schools (look for Figure 7in the report). But think of that three-year assertion another way: Parents of freshmen might have to wait until their children are seniors to know if there are measurable gains in overall school achievement.

When Race To The Top was first announced, followed by the innovation initiative and then the turnaround grants, I wondered about equity. What would happen in districts that don't have grant writers on staff, have a shortage of motivated campus leaders or can't find the necessary community partners to support reforms? Would the shift to competitive funding mean less money reaching the neediest students?

According to the CEP report, school districts are willing to ask for outside help -- and to hire it (check out Figure 6). Will this mean another gold rush for education management companies, similar to the trends we've seenin for-profit charter schools, online learning programs and NCLB-mandated tutoring services? Those industries have all been criticized to some degree for a lack of oversight and accountability. Will the improvement grant boom result in similar challenges?

The School Improvement Grant (SIG) program gives districts four options: to "restart" the campus with an outside operator, such as a charter school, in charge; to "turnaround" a school by replacing the principal and at least 50 percent of the staff; to "transform" the campus with a new principal and new educational philosophy; or to close a school outright and use federal money to provide those students with educational alternatives.

Certainly the last scenario is the most dire. But in most communities, according to the CEP report, fears that there would be a rash of school closures haven't materialized.

In fact, of the districts implementing SIG funding, only 12 percent had any schools that chose the closure option. The transformation model was by far the most popular,with 76 percent of districts using it in at least one school. Turnaround schools made up 42 percent, and 23 percent of schools opted to restart with an outside operator.

No one likes to talk about it, but we all know schools where it might actually be best if the doors simply shut and didn't reopen. However, closing schools -- and using the federal grant money to make room for more students at a district's campuses that are thriving already-- probably doesn't make superintendents popular.

It's too soon to tell whether any of these changes will make a difference. But in the meantime, I have questions: Why should this year's freshmen have to wait until they are seniors to see their school achieve? Is it fair to make them the latest guinea pigs in the seemingly never-ending cycle of reform after reform after reform? If the clock continually restarts with every new initiative, how is progress ever truly measured?

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

The Nation's Report Card: Up In Math, But Stuck On Same Page in Reading

The nation's fourth and eighth graders continued a steady trend of improved performance in mathematics, but reading scores were unchanged from the 2009 results.(Click here for the NAEP web site and here for the Associated Press story.)

The National Assessment of Educational Progress, known as "the Nation's Report Card,"is administered every two years. When NAEP started in 1990, participation was voluntary. By 2003 it was mandatory that all states allow the test to be administered to a statistical sampling of its students.

I took part in a web press conference for the release of the NAEP results, and here were some of the highlights that jumped out at me:

• The achievement gap among minority and white students, as well as economically disadvantaged students and their more affluent peers, hasn't budged. Closing the gap was the primary purpose of No Child Left Behind.

• This was the first year that NAEP broke out achievement specifically for students of Asian descent, instead of including them in a wider category that also included Pacific Islanders.

•  Nevada saw its reading scores improve despite two truly dreadful years of soaring unemployment, hundreds of millions of dollars in cuts to public education and an ever-growing population of high-need students.

Nevada Superintendent Keith Rheault, who took part in the webinar, said "the improvements have been steady, not spectacular, but over the past eight years, they have added up to quite a bit." (Click here for the Las Vegas Sun's story.) Rheault also noted that Nevada remains the bottom quarter of states for overall NAEP scores, even as its in the top quarter of states that are showing gains.

There was another interesting moment, when one of the webinar attendees asked what correlations might be drawn  from the nation's math scores improving even as reading scores stagnate. Jack Buckley, commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, was blunt.

"We spend a lot of time making sure the measurement is valid," Buckley said. "We are not the people to turn to for the `why.'"

Buckley noted that "folks are quick to use these scores to evaluate their favorite policies and programs ... but it's very complicated. We're happy that NAEP is there to start these conversations, but it's definitely not the definitive answer."

I appreciated Buckley's willingness to acknowledge the limitations of statistical data, but it also points to the difficulty of actually using the NAEP results to actually improve student performance. As for Nevada, Rheault said the state's reading scores began turning around after receiving a hefty federal grant to implement intensive interventions. When it comes to education reform, cause-and-effect relationships aren't always easy to establish.

David Driscoll, chairman of the National Assessment Governing Board, which oversees NAEP, called the flat-lined reading scores "deeply disappointing."

Driscoll is correct. How many more points would students would have gained in math if their reading comprehension had been stronger?

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.

NCLB Waivers Could Spell Demise For Tutoring Program

Chris Williams of the Associated Press has an important story about the likely demise of Supplemental Education Services, thanks to the U.S. Department of Education's intentions to offer waivers from some of the more rigid elements of No Child Left Behind. (Click here for the link.)

I freely admit that the mandatory tutoring program (which districts are required to offer and pay for at schools with low achievement) has long been a thorn in my paw. Back in 2007, the program was the focus of one of my enterprise investigative projects as the Las Vegas Sun's education reporter. I discovered that not only was Nevada forced to pay millions of dollars annually to private tutoring companies, but no also one was tracking whether or not the tutoring was making any difference in student achievement. (Click here for the link.)

From the outset, there were significant problems with the logic of SES.  First of all, there was no requirement that the tutoring programs focus on recruiting the lowest-achieving students within the under-performing campus. That meant that many of the students who actually signed up were already performing well academically. Additionally, the quality of the tutoring varied widely, from well-known established brands like Sylvan to entrepreneurial individuals who started fly-by-night companies expressly for the purpose of hitching a ride on the SES gravy train.

In an effort to instill a free market element to the process, families were provided with a list of tutoring companies, approved by the state, and told to choose one. At the same time, individual schools were prohibited from advising families on which company to sign up with, which meant parents often had no one they could ask for recommendations. Schools couldn't point parents to the more successful, reputable vendors, nor could they warn parents about the shadier operators.

Another part of the problem is that NCLB requires states to evaluate the tutoring programs, but doesn't provide funds to carry out the necessary large-scales studies. Some states made halfhearted efforts at compliance, which others never even tried.

To be sure, some tutoring companies almost certainly helped some students. But as a large-scale initiative, SES appears to have muddled along with far too little oversight.

Have a question, comment or concern for the Educated Reporter? Email me at erichmond@ewa.org. I'm also on Twitter @EWAEmily.