I've been going through state RTT scores, and based on what I'm seeing, I'm becoming convinced that states should refuse to capitulate to stakeholder demands to weaken their applications. I'm growing confident that states that put together bold proposals can win in the second round even if a significant number of their unions and districts refuse to sign on.
Monday's events strongly suggested otherwise. First, the two winners were unique in their ability to craft good plans and get virtually all of their districts and unions to sign on. As I wrote here, the clear message was that both a strong plan and unanimous stakeholder support were necessary. Second, in comments to the media, Secretary Duncan underscored this point, praising Delaware and Tennessee for gaining the support of their unions and touching all students within their borders.
But the section-by-section scores indicate that bold applications can still come out on top, even if stakeholders withhold their benediction. As I'll show in a series of upcoming posts, Florida, Louisiana, and Rhode Island lost for a number of reasons--some legitimate and some curious--but these issues can be addressed without watering down their plans.
Secretary Duncan's comments in support of broad union and district buy-in are completely understandable. In terms of policy, it's better to have such consensus if you can get it:??more students would be affected and there's a better chance of reform being well implemented. And those comments probably earned the administration points from the nation's teachers unions, who fought hard for the program's stakeholder support provisions.
But it's far better to have great, long-enduring reforms implemented in a limited number of districts than meaningless reforms implemented statewide. States need to know that if they reach a point in the next 60 days where they??must decide between a strong plan with weak stakeholder support and a watered-down plan with broad stakeholder support, they can and should choose the former.
So to Florida, Louisiana, Rhode Island and any other state with big reform aspirations but powerful reform opponents:
Don't. Back. Down.
--Andy Smarick