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here to go back to the LWVO Education Update Main Page To: LWVO From: Joan Platz Education Update for January 29, 2007 1) State of the Union Address: President George Bush presented the State of the Union Address before a joint session of Congress on January 23, 2007. In his speech the President proposed balancing the budget without raising taxes, eliminating earmarks in the budget, stabilizing entitlement programs, and tackling energy, immigration, and health care. The President also proposed strengthening the No Child Left Behind Act, which is facing reauthorization this year, by providing more flexibility to schools to improve student achievement, vouchers for children who attend failing schools, increased funds for intervention, and supports to increase math and science skills. A transcript of the speech is available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/stateoftheunion/2007/index.html 2) Bush Administration Releases NCLB Priorities: On January 24, 2007 U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings released "No Child Left Behind, Building on Results: A Blueprint for Strengthening the No Child Left Behind Act." The Blueprint expands upon the points outlined by President Bush in the State of the Union Address in which he advocates for the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act this year. It also provides information about the impact of NCLB, and examples of current state initiatives that have been successful in meeting the goals of the law. The Blueprint focuses on the following five areas to strengthen the law: Every Child Performing at or Above Grade Level by 2014. -Maintain annual academic assessments and accountability systems that measure students individually and by student groups. -Participate in the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) and include state NAEP results on the state public report cards. -Provide support for cross-state comparisons of student results. Flexibility for Innovation and Improvement. -Provide additional flexibility, options, and tools to states to improve their accountability systems and demonstrate gains in student achievement. -Encourage the use of growth models to measure student progress. For a growth model to work under NCLB it must follow the core principles: ensure growth toward proficient standards by 2014 and use assessments and data to determine the progress of each student subgroup. -Allow states and districts to prioritize support based on a school's success. -Require school districts to notify parents of their choice and SES options no later than 30 days prior to the beginning of the school year. -Permit innovative approaches to assess students with disabilities and teaching English to limited English proficient (LEP) students. -Recognize schools that make significant progress in moving LEP students toward English proficiency. -Streamline the application process for federal support. -Allow 100 percent of funds to be transferable, including Perkins Funds. -Permit the secretary of education to respond comprehensively when there is a natural disaster or emergency. -Provide more flexibility to rural districts. -Consolidate the current Safe and Drug Free Schools into a single more flexible discretionary program focused on four area: Emergency Planning, Preventing Violence and drug Use, School Culture and Climate, and Emerging Needs. Challenging Our Students and Preparing Them to Succeed. -Establish the expectation that every high school student will graduate on time with a diploma that indicates readiness for success in postsecondary education and the 21st century workforce. -Use a more accurate calculation for graduation rate. -Require states to develop course level academic standards for two years of English and math that will prepare high school graduates to succeed in college or the workplace by 2010-11. -Require states to administer assessments aligned to these standards and publicly report the extent to which all students are on track to enter college or the workplace fully prepared by 2012-13. The results of these assessments will not be part of the state's accountability system. -Increase and dedicate Title I resources to help at-risk high school students stay in school and on the path to graduation. -Expand Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate programs. -Require states to report completion rates of these college readiness courses by relevant subgroups. -Utilize an Adjunct Teacher Corps composed of professionals from the math and science fields to provide expertise and support in the classroom. Helping Teachers Close the Achievement Gap. -Create a Teacher Incentive Fund to reward teachers and principals whose students make exceptional progress. -Create the President's Math Now for Elementary and Middle School Students programs to promote and implement proven, research-based instructional methods. -Include science in the state accountability systems. -Incorporate an expectation that all students achieve proficiency in science by 2019-20 school year. -Invest in Reading First. -Expand Striving Readers. Strengthening Public Schools and Empowering Parents "The administration strongly believes in pubic education. We also believe that private schools are an important and effective alternative for many parents, especially those whose children attend chronically underperforming schools." -Support the spread of charter schools and the new Promise Scholarship voucher program, which schools in restructuring status will offer to low income students in grades 3-12. Students will either be able to attend a private schools or a school in another district, or receive intensive tutoring. Federal funds will follow the child to his or her new schools. This money will be supplemented by a federal scholarship of $2,500 for an average total scholarship of approximately $4000 or tuition for tutoring up to $3000. -Target School Improvement Grants in challenging schools. -Change the menu of options for schools in the fifth year of improvement so that schools either make substantial changes in staff or reconstitute the schools' governance structure. -Allow a school in restructuring status to be turned over to an elected official such as a city mayor, if this provision is consistent with state law. -Remove limitations on teacher transfers from collective bargaining agreements for schools in restructuring status through Title 1 law. -Support local decisions to restructure schools as charter schools even if state law limits the number of possible charter schools within that state. "The development of new charter schools would help states and school districts address the primary challenge many districts face in implementing public school choice: insufficient seats at schools where students could transfer. Additional public charter schools could resolve capacity problems in both urban schools districts, where quality schools are often over-enrolled, and in rural school districts, where the establishment of virtual charter schools would provide a practical new option for families living in isolated areas." -Provide larger Supplemental Educational Services (SES) per-child amounts for students who live in rural areas or who have disabilities or limited English proficiency. -Increase SES funding for students with disabilities or LEP. -Permit flexibility in the use of Title I funds to implement SES programs. -Provide SES to all low-income students who attend a school in program improvement status from the first year forward, a year earlier than before. -Allow districts to set aside funding to conduct quality parent outreach campaigns. -Require districts to spend all of their SES and choice funds each year or risk forfeiting the balance of the 20 percent set-asides for these activities. -Reinforce mechanisms to ensure that parents and students are given proper notice of their SES and choice options and that high quality SES services are provided. -Expand programs for at risk students such as Striving Readers and Troops to Teachers to private schools. According to Secretary Spellings, "No Child Left Behind is a work in progress: every day, we learn what works so students can make greater progress. Five years after the law's passage, we have collected more data than ever before about the academic performance of our students and schools. This information enables us to take action -- and act we must." To read more please visit: http://www.ed.gov/policy/elsec/leg/nclb/buildingonresults.html 3) News from the 127th Ohio General Assembly: *Although the 127th General Assembly is hardly a month old, both the Ohio Senate and House will need to replace one of their members in the near future. In the House Keith Faber (77th House District) resigned his House seat to serve in the Ohio Senate. Jim Zehringer has been selected by a House Steering Committee to fill the seat, and is expected to be approved by the House in February. Senator Kimberly Zurz was selected last week by Governor Strickland to serve as the director of the Department of Commerce, and will be leaving the Ohio Senate where she served the 28th Senate District. It is not certain when her replacement will be selected, but the process is underway. *The Ohio Legislative Black Caucus elected officers last week. Selected president is Representative Tyrone Yates from Cincinnati; vice presidents - Senator Shirley Smith, Representatives Edna Brown, and Clayton Luckie; treasurer - Senator Eric H. Kearney; secretary - Representative Tracy Heard; sergeant-at-arms - Representative Michael DeBose; chaplain - Representative Joyce Beatty; and Senator Ray Miller was appointed dean of the caucus. "OLBC aims to promote, foster, and sponsor the education of African Americans and others on the importance of involvement in party politics in order to secure a fair share of government services for their communities. The organization continues to ensure equality for all citizens by encouraging, nurturing and developing civic and political initiatives. OLBC also provides direction and encouragement to groups seeking legislation on all governmental levels that is responsive to the needs of the community. OLBC's diverse membership, which includes elected officials, business leaders and community activist throughout Ohio, strives to encourage within the African American community loyalty to the American Constitution." (Source: OLBC web site.) The OLBC is currently developing budget priorities to present to the 127th General Assembly. For more information on the work of the caucus please visit http://www.olbc1967.org. 4) Census Report on Child Well-being: The U.S. Census Bureau issued in January 2007 a new report called "A Child's Day 2003: Selected Indicators of Child Well-Being" based on the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) from February - May 2003. The report is written by Jane Lawler Dye and Tallese D. Johnson. This is the third report the Census Bureau has released on the daily activities of children, and includes data on living arrangements and family characteristics, early care experiences, interaction with parents, television viewing, extra curricular activities, academic experiences, and income levels and parent education experiences. The report can be found at http://www.census.gov/prod/2007pubs/p70-109.pdf. The data sample represented 72.7 million children living in households with at least one designated parent. Overall the report found, "These data show that income and family structure affect various aspects of children's everyday life. Children living in families below the poverty level, children whose parents have lower levels of educational attainment, and children in families with single parents tend to have less daily interaction with their parents, such as talking, being read to, or sharing daily meals, than their counterparts in other situations." The following are excerpts from the report: *Household and Family Characteristics: "Seventy million children lived with a female designated parent, while 2.8 million children lived with a male designated parent. Most children, 51.8 million, were living with a designated parent who was currently married; hence, they were living in a two-parent family. Another 12.5 million children were living with a designated parent who was separated, divorced, or widowed, while 8.4 million were living with a designated parent who had never married." *Childcare: "18 million children (38 percent) under 12 years old had been cared for regularly in a nonrelative child care arrangement at some point in their childhood." *Parent child interaction, including reading to children: "The extent of reading to children was also related to the designated parent's educational attainment. Twenty-three percent of 1- to 2- year-olds whose parents did not complete high school were never read to, compared with 4 percent whose parent had an advanced degree." *Extracurricular Activities: "In every age group, children whose family incomes were above 200 percent of the poverty threshold were more likely to be involved in activities after school than children living below poverty. This finding is not unexpected as participation in these activities often involves expenditures as well as parental time, both of which may be more difficult for children in poverty to afford." *Academic Experiences: "Nationally, 75 percent of children 12 to 17 years old currently enrolled in school were academically on-track (Table 9). This represents a 3 percentage-point increase since the previous SIPP child well-being module was conducted in 2000 and a 6 percentage-point increase since the first SIPP child well-being module was conducted in 1994." *Gifted Experiences: "Thirteen percent of children 6 to 11 years old and 24 percent of children 12 to 17 years old were in such classes, which include honors and advanced placement classes in high school. For 12- to 17-year olds, this represents a 2 percentage-point increase since the last child well-being module conducted in 2000." *Changing Schools: "Not including the normal progression through elementary and middle schools, 24 percent of children 6 to 11 years old and 41 percent of children 12 to 17 years old who had ever attended or been enrolled in first grade or higher had changed schools at some time in their academic career (Table 10)." *Repeating Grades and Suspension From Schools: "Six percent of children 6 to 11 years old and 10 percent of children 12 to 17 years old had ever repeated a grade." *Educational Expectations: "Parents with advanced degrees (52 percent) were twice as likely as parents with a high school education (25 percent) to want their children to get an education beyond college. Regardless of the parent's level of educational attainment, parental expectations about what their children would achieve fell below what they desired for their children." Other information on child well-being from the SIPP can be found in the following reports: Jason M. Fields and Kristin E. Smith, "Poverty, Family Structure, and Child Well-Being: Indicators From the SIPP," Population Division Working Paper Series, No. 23, U.S. Census Bureau, Washington DC, 1998; Kristin E. Smith, Loretta E. Bass, and Jason M. Fields, "Child Well-Being Indicators From the SIPP," Population Division Working Paper Series No. 24, U.S. Census Bureau, Washington DC, 1998. 5) New Resources from the ECS: The Education Commission of the States (ESC) helps state leaders identify, develop, and implement public policy for education that addresses the current and future needs of a learning society. Recent additions to their resources include the following: -A new tool called the Research Studies Database has been designed to help policymakers make decisions about educational issues based on research. Currently twelve studies about high school reform have been included in the data base. Future data bases will be developed for teaching quality, restructuting schools, and more. For each study, the online tool features concise, bulleted lists of findings and results, policy implications and recommendations. All studies included in the data base tool have been published by highly selective research organizations and have been peer-reviewed. To learn more please visit the ESC at http://www.ecs.org/00CN3310 -The latest issue of the ESC's "The Progress of Education Reform" highlights two research reviews on the effectiveness of gender separate classes, programs, and activities for enhancing education achievement. The issue is available at http://www.ecs.org/00CN3311 -The latest "ESC StateNote" provides estimates of what is costs per day for school operations for extending the school year. This article is available at http://www.ecs.org/00CN3312 -A new ESC Center for Evaluation and Education Policy report highlights research on the effects of the amount of instructional time and professional development on student achievement in a report that focuses on the state of Indiana. The report is available at http://www.ecs.org/00CN3313. -The State Higher Education Executive Officers have released a report examining the philosophies, policies and procedures that drive decision making regarding public college and university tuition, fees and student financial aid programs, and issues related to higher education affordability. This report is available at http://www.ecs.org/00CN3314 6) Achievement Gap Report: A report issued in November 2006 by the Northwest Evaluation Association (NWEA) found that students from poor schools grew less academically than students from wealthy schools, and minority students showed less academic growth than non-minority peers in every grade and for every group. The findings appear in "Achievement Gaps: An Examination of the Differences in Student Achievement and Growth" by Martha S. McCall, Carl Hauser, John Cronia, G. Gage Kingsbury, and Ronald Hauser. The study sample included student data from the NWEA Growth Research Database in reading and mathematics in grades 3-8 from 24 states. (569,564 students in reading in grades 3-8 and 542,057 students in mathematics in grades 3-8). The study confirmed previous longitudinal studies regarding the achievement gap among groups of students, and also looked at the academic growth of individual students and found, -In mathematics, students enrolled in high-poverty schools tend to grow less academically during the school year than students enrolled in low-poverty schools. -African-American students grow less academically during the school year than students in other groups. This difference is more noticeable in mathematics than in reading. -African-American students and Hispanic students at all achievement levels lose more achievement during the summer than similar European-American students. -Students enrolled in high poverty schools lose more achievement during the summer than similar students who are enrolled in low-poverty schools. "In general, students enrolled in high poverty schools, African-American students and Hispanic students begin school with lower skills, grow less academically during the school year and lose more skills over the summer than their wealthier and European-American peers. This phenomenon is observed at each grade in the educational system. In the case of the African-American students in these samples, the concern carries added emphasis. Their rate of change over the two-year projection was the lowest of all groups." "The study found that no rate of change/growth in any minority group was sufficiently strong to close or reduce the observed achievement gap between groups of students in any substantive way before the end of their K-12 career." "However, the rate of growth is not sufficient to close the gap in scores. What we see as a gap in student performance in different groups is made up of thousands of individual students engaging academic content in thousands of unique ways. This study does not make policy recommendations, but it is hoped that it will illuminate the problem for policymakers and for the public as a whole." The study and its summary are available at http://www.nwea.org/research/achievementgap.asp 7) Public Education for the Common Good: A report released on January 25, 2007 by the Center on Education Policy describes the essential role that public education plays in America's democratic society today, and warns about the impact of some education reform efforts on the mission of public education. The report is called, "Why We Still Need Public Schools: Public Education for the Common Good" by Nancy Kober, and includes a history of public education; how the public education system in America evolved; six core public missions that public schools fulfill; and why these missions are relevant today. According to the author, public schools have evolved over time in the United States, and have assumed several purposes in addition to their academic mission. These include effectively preparing all students for a satisfying life, good job, and active citizenship; promoting social cohesion and a shared culture; guaranteeing universal access to a free education; ensuring equity and non-discrimination; promoting public accountability and responsiveness; and ensuring religious neutrality while respecting religious freedom. What has been missing from the debate over school reform is the impact of certain laws, policies, and initiatives on the overall mission of public education. For example, some education reform efforts, such as vouchers, undermine the purposes of public education by diverting sparse public resources to private schools, and providing benefits for individuals rather than support the public benefit of education. According to the Center on Education Policy the following questions should be considered when education reform initiatives are being proposed: "-Will the proposed reform produce an education of the quality needed to effectively prepare young people: (a) to lead fulfilling and contributing lives, (b) to be productively employed, and (c) to be responsible citizens in a democratic society? -Will the proposed reform promote a cohesive American society by bringing together children from diverse backgrounds and encouraging them to get along? Will it help to form a shared American culture and to transmit democratic values? -Will the proposed reform guarantee a public education that is universally accessible to all children within the governing jurisdiction and is free of charge to parents and students? -Will the proposed reform provide the same quality of education for poor children as for non-poor children? Will it treat all children justly and without discrimination based on race, ethnicity, gender, disability, religious affiliation, or economic status? -Will the proposed reform ensure that education supported with public dollars remains accountable to taxpayers and the public authorities that represent them? Will the reform be responsive to the needs of local communities and afford citizens a voice in the governance of their schools? -Will the proposed reform provide a public education that is religiously neutral and respectful of religious freedom?" The report is available on CEP's web site at http://www.cep-dc.org/PublicSchoolFacts/why/ 8) Results of Harris Poll on Music Education: A Harris Interactive survey released in 2006 shows that a majority of school administrators believe that music education is an essential element of every child's education. According to the survey results 96 percent of principals believe that participating in music education encourages and motivates students to stay in school longer, and 89 percent believe that music education contributes to higher education rates. The survey was conducted for the International Music Products Association (NAMM) and The National Association for Music Education (MENC). The survey also found that less than 10 percent of a high school's instructional budget is allocated to its music program. Approximately 20 percent of a school's music budget is funded from outside the school through fundraising efforts. "This lack of funding is one of the reasons why only 50 percent of public high schools include music as a core academic subject, and only two thirds of these high schools require participation in a music or other arts course for graduation." The study also found that four out of five school administrators who do have music programs say they are aligned to state or national standards and require their music teachers to be credentialed. Information about the poll is available at http://www.namm.org/wanna_play/wanna-play-releases/harris-poll/view |
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Ohio Fair Schools
Campaign, 94 Columbus Road
Athens, Ohio 45701
Tel. (740)592-2866 Fax (740)593-5451
Athens, Ohio 45701
Tel. (740)592-2866 Fax (740)593-5451