Paige makes teacher-ed hive buzz

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / August 15, 2002

In June, Education Secretary Rod Paige issued an important report, the first "Secretary's Annual Report on Teacher Quality." What a splendid fuss it has kicked up-and hurrah for Paige for standing his ground.

Entitled "Meeting the Highly Qualified Teachers Challenge" (and previously noted by the Gadfly at http://www.edexcellence.net/gadfly/issue.cfm?issue=54#802), this report responded to two statutory stimuli. Title II of the Higher Education Act (as amended in 1998) created a national reporting system meant to address the quality of teacher preparation. Reports are filed by every teacher training program and then submitted by every state to the Secretary of Education, with the Secretary mandated to tell Congress what these reports show, what patterns he sees, what problems are evident, etc. (The first set of those institutional and state reports came in 2001 and was posted on the web in November. You can find them and more at www.title2.org.)

Additionally, the No Child Left Behind Act requires that, by 2005-6, every teacher of a core academic subject in an American public school be "highly qualified," with this defined as both possessing full state certification AND demonstrating mastery of the content of the subjects to be taught.

Paige's June report thus dealt both with the current state of American primary/secondary schools vis-??-vis NCLB's "highly qualified teacher" requirement and with the evidence yielded by the first cycle of the Title II reporting system. But it did more. It also offered a searching, critical and lucid

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Paige makes teacher-ed hive buzz

Showdowns over vouchers in state courts

August 15, 2002

In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Zelman that the Cleveland voucher program does not offend the First Amendment, The Christian Science Monitor reports that state legislatures in California, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Kansas, Minnesota, and Maine will introduce voucher legislation this year. And in Washington, D.C., House Republicans say they will introduce legislation to create a voucher program for the District of Columbia.

But voucher programs face many hurdles at the state level. Last Monday, a Florida judge ruled that the state's school voucher law violates the state constitution's prohibition against the use of state revenue to aid any church, religious denomination, or sectarian institution. (On Friday, the same judge ruled that the voucher program could continue while the case moves forward on appeal, but that the state must set aside $2.5 million which will be given back to the public schools if the appeals court upholds his ruling against the voucher program.)

The Florida decision also draws attention to similar provisions prohibiting aid to religious institutions- known as Blaine amendments- in other state constitutions. Opponents of vouchers hope to use these provisions to challenge voucher programs nationwide, but advocates hope to strike first by filing lawsuits challenging the Blaine amendments themselves.

Blaine amendments were inserted into state constitutions in the late 19th Century at a time of strong anti-Catholic sentiment. James G. Blaine, "the man from Maine," a Republican Senator, proposed an amendment to the U.S. Constitution after Catholics,

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Showdowns over vouchers in state courts

A blueprint for reforming California's schools

August 15, 2002

The Pacific Research Institute has issued a brief guide to improving public education in the Golden State. The mini-report advocates 10 commonsensical but hard-to-implement reforms including: providing a school-choice accountability option, adopting value-added testing, introducing merit/ differential pay and testing for teachers, and ensuring the use of proven teaching methods and curricula. "A Ten-Point Agenda for Improving Education in California," by Lance T. Izumi, Pacific Research Institute, June 2002

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A blueprint for reforming California's schools

Choice is not a magic bullet, researchers argue

August 15, 2002

In an article in this summer's Harvard Educational Review, Dan Goldhaber and Eric Eide summarize research on the impact of school choice on minority students in urban settings. They write that relatively little evidence exists that school choice is having a clear-cut impact, and conclude that the mixed results suggest that choice alone will not transform urban school systems. For an abstract of "What Do We Know (and Need to Know) about the Impact of School Choice Reforms on Disadvantaged Students," Harvard Educational Review, Summer 2002, visit http://gseweb.harvard.edu/%7Ehepg/su02.htm#goldhaber. For the full text, you must purchase a copy of the Summer 2002 issue for $20 plus $5 shipping and handling by visiting http://gseweb.harvard.edu/%7Ehepg/herbiorder.html or dialing 800-513-0763.

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Choice is not a magic bullet, researchers argue

Contract awarded for "What Works" Clearinghouse

August 15, 2002

The U.S. Department of Education has awarded an $18.5 million contract to develop a national What Works Clearinghouse to summarize and disseminate evidence on the effectiveness of various education interventions. Run by the Campbell Collaboration and the American Institutes for Research (with an assist from the Education Quality Institute), the clearinghouse will feature searchable online databases that include summaries of the scientific evidence on programs, products and practices designed to enhance student outcomes, on broader educational approaches and policies, and on test instruments. For more see "U. S. Department of Education Awards Contract For 'What Works Clearinghouse'," press release, U.S. Department of Education, August 7, 2002

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Contract awarded for "What Works" Clearinghouse

Effectiveness of class size reforms hinges on student misbehavior

August 15, 2002

The larger a class is, the more student misbehavior reduces teaching effectiveness, suggests research by Edward Lazear, published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics. If student behavior is good-as in Japan, and in private schools, which don't tolerate misbehavior-schools can increase class size without sacrificing achievement, but class sizes should be decreased in schools where misbehavior is common. For a summary of the research, see "Student Misbehavior Solves Classroom Size Mystery," Daily Policy Digest, National Center for Policy Analysis, August 8, 2002.

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Effectiveness of class size reforms hinges on student misbehavior

The liberal case for privatization

August 15, 2002

Harvard Law School professor Martha Minow is ambivalent about the Supreme Court's decision in Zelman, but she has come to believe that the left's opposition to the privatization of social services is simplistic. In a new book, Partners, Not Rivals: Privatization and the Public Good, Minow explores how privatization can improve the quality and variety of services available to citizens in education, health care, job training, and child welfare. Minow is profiled in "Public Dollars and Public Values," by David Glenn, Chronicle of Higher Education, August 9, 2002

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The liberal case for privatization

Charter School Funding Issues

Marci Kanstoroom, Ph.D. / August 15, 2002

Stephen Sugarman, Education Policy Analysis Archives
August 9, 2002

In this short policy brief, Stephen Sugarman explores eight complications of charter school funding-challenging issues that require the attention of policy wonks and policymakers. He lists four inconsistencies in our current system of financing public schools and then explores their impact on charter school funding. While much attention has been paid to spending inequalities across and within school districts, for instance, Sugarman notes that these inequalities often create undesirable incentives when charter schools enter the picture. For example, if charter schools are funded at a level equal to per pupil spending in the districts that charter them, then resource-poor, low-spending districts-which may have the most to gain from charter schools-may have trouble attracting charter operators. The author goes on to describe some tricky issues that relate to charter school funding in particular-whether per pupil funding should be based on the number of pupils enrolled in a school or the number who attend regularly, for instance, or whether virtual charter schools serving home schooled students should be funded at the same rate as brick-and-mortar charter schools. The strength of the charter movement may depend on solving some of the more vexing funding issues, and Sugarman notes that efforts by state legislatures to rationalize charter school funding mechanisms may also lead to improvements in the funding of regular public schools. The brief is available online at http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v10n34.html.

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Charter School Funding Issues

Coping with Teacher Shortages

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / August 15, 2002

Patrick Murphy and Erin Novak, Annie E. Casey Foundation
2002

The Annie E. Casey Foundation is the publisher of this 66-page "resource guide" by Patrick Murphy and Erin Novak of the University of San Francisco. Its goal is "to assist a district in dealing with the myriad of variables that must be considered in developing a strategy to respond to the teacher shortage." Because it is district-focused, it tends to accept the political and policy constraints within which public school systems operate and thus not to tackle the ways by which teacher shortages could be radically reduced via policy action at the state level (e.g. easing conventional certification requirements) and by fundamentally reshaping teacher compensation systems. Within its limits, however, it does a nice job of explaining the ins and outs of teacher shortages and profiling sundry programs that districts might adopt or adapt in order to ameliorate those shortages and strengthen their teaching force. It's more "how to solve your immediate problem," though, than "how to get to the bottom of this mess and come up with sounder long-term policies." You can download it from
http://www.aecf.org/publications/pdfs/teacher_shortages.pdf or order a free copy by dialing 410-223-2890. (For multiple copies, send an email to webmail@aecf.org)

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Coping with Teacher Shortages

Finding the Right Balance

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / August 15, 2002

Charles Glenn and Jan de Groof
2002

This ungainly (600-page) and unattractive book conducts a terrific tour of how 25 countries handle the trade-offs and crosscurrents among freedom, autonomy and accountability in primary and secondary schooling. At ten to thirty pages per nation, it's replete with information about those countries' educational arrangements, structures, legal frameworks, and actual practices. Authors Charles Glenn of Boston University and Jan de Groof of the College d'Europe describe their purpose as objectively presenting "the solutions chosen by a number of countries to the tension between promoting freedom and advancing other legitimate goals in the organization of their educational systems." The final chapter-"preliminary conclusions," with another entire volume soon to follow-begins to evaluate these solutions, mainly by taking up one after another of the characteristic American objections to school choice. More reference work than page-turner, it will be a solid addition to the libraries of those interested in comparative education policy as well as those seeking more perspective on the issues that roil American education policy and politics. The ISBN is 9059311159 and you can learn more at http://www.lemma.nl/Autosite/Boeken/984.htm.

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Finding the Right Balance

Race in American Public Schools: Rapidly Resegregating School Districts

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / August 15, 2002

Erica Frankenberg and Chungmei Lee, The Civil Rights Project, Harvard University
August 2002

A new study by Erica Frankenberg and Chungmei Lee of Harvard's Civil Rights Project asserts that, after decades of progress toward racial desegregation, many school districts are now resegregating, due to the gradual demise of court ordered busing and other such involuntary desegregation strategies. Of the 239 sizable school districts studied, virtually all are becoming more segregated for African American and Latino students. Perhaps surprisingly, districts in the South are experiencing the least black-white resegregation. For Latino students, however, segregation has risen since the late 1960s, with targeted desegregation efforts rare. Characteristic of this Harvard project, the report makes no mention of evidence that choice-based reforms reduce school segregation by breaking the link between residential and school segregation. Nor is it much interested in school quality and teacher effectiveness. In fact, it maintains a blind faith in court-ordered integration and a fixation on the color of the child in the next seat rather than what's being learned there. You can find it at http://www.civilrightsproject.harvard.edu/research/deseg/reseg_schools02.php.

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Race in American Public Schools: Rapidly Resegregating School Districts

The Funding Gap

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / August 15, 2002

Education Trust
August 2002

This short (11-page) study by the Education Trust has drawn some media attention because it reaches the kind of conclusion that the press loves: schools serving poor and minority kids are getting gypped when it comes to state and local funding. (See "Neediest Schools Receive Less Money, Report Finds," by Diana Jean Schemo, The New York Times, August 9, 2002, http://www.nytimes.com/2002/08/09/education/09FUND.html.) The facts, of course, are somewhat more complicated than the headlines. In many jurisdictions, funding formulae-especially those that distribute state dollars-do help compensate for the underlying problem, namely that school systems with lots of poor kids are often in poor communities without much wealth to spend on education. That was the original point of "state equalization" (or "foundation") funding, and often it works. What's distressing to find in these Education Trust data are a number of places-most vividly New York-where the state dollars seem to exacerbate the problem of unequal spending. There are many reasons for this, including the political idiosyncrasies of some state-local relationships. (The Illinois data, for example, are dominated by Chicago's relationship to the state, as Pennsylvania's are by Philadelphia and New York's by New York City.) The big question, though, barely addressed in this report, is whether redirecting more resources into heavily minority and low-income school systems will produce more learning in their classrooms. Of course that depends on how the money gets spent. Across-the-board raises for current staff members aren't

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The Funding Gap

The New Public School Parent

Chester E. Finn, Jr. / August 15, 2002

Bob Chase with Bob Katz
July 2002

Outgoing NEA president Bob Chase has (with Bob Katz's help) penned this 276-page paperbound book subtitled "how to get the best education for your child." Chase is an affable, decent fellow whose union-reforming efforts did not fare as well as many had hoped. He's also a former teacher whose interest in children was never in doubt. Now he appears to be turning over yet another leaf, evolving into an education advisor for parents. This volume contains a plethora of advice about such parent-involvement basics as homework, technology, testing and what to do if your child is bullied. Most of that advice is sound. Chase even does a decent job of explaining charter schools to parents without too much negative spin. He's predictably harsh on vouchers, however, vague about academic content, negative on testing and mealy-mouthed in explaining what to do when children encounter bad teachers. And of course the main role he envisions for parents is "helping" the system to do better by children, not demanding a better or different sort of system. Still, for an ex-NEA president, it's a surprisingly constructive piece of work that contains some good advice and sensible ideas. The ISBN is 0142001368. You can learn more at http://www.penguinputnam.com/Book/BookFrame/0,1007,,00.html?0CS^0142001368.

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The New Public School Parent

The Politics of School-Based Management: Understanding the Process of Devolving Authority in Urban School Districts

Kelly Scott / August 15, 2002

Elaine M. Walker, Education Policy Analysis Archives
August 4, 2002

In recent decades, decentralization has become a popular education reform strategy. It assumes that educational improvement will occur when the makers of decisions are close to the decisions' impact. In theory, school-based management (SBM), a method of decentralization, also brings parents, teachers and concerned citizens into the decision-making fold. But when put into practice in New Jersey's poorest school districts, it only muddied the governance waters and diluted accountability, writes author Elaine Walker. In her study of SBM in thirty New Jersey districts, Walker found that: 1) state power and authority usurped local autonomy; 2) districts and SBM teams were given little room to build capacity; 3) SBM teams became teacher-dominated, thereby minimizing parental and community participation in decision-making; and 4) without clear guidance from the state, SBM engendered conflict among the groups whose voices it was intended to amplify. The paper concludes with policy options that states and localities ought to consider before jumping on the SBM bandwagon. This brief report is available at http://epaa.asu.edu/epaa/v10n33.html.

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The Politics of School-Based Management: Understanding the Process of Devolving Authority in Urban School Districts