The Education Gadfly Weekly

Intel’s recent announcement that it will cease sponsoring and underwriting the prestigious Science Talent Search, which it took over from Westinghouse in 1998, is another nail in the coffin of gifted education in the United States.

Unlike many European and Asian countries, which are awash in academic competitions, Olympiads, and other status-laden contests that bright students vie to win, American K?12 education has relatively few that anyone notices. There is, of course, the National Spelling Bee, which Scripps has valiantly stuck with since 1941. But spelling bees are for middle schoolers. The big deal for high schoolers, especially those with a bent toward STEM subjects, has long been the Science Talent Search, which President George H. W. Bush called the “Super Bowl of science.”

Intel’s turnabout surprised former CEO Craig Barrett and disheartened many of us who care about both STEM and gifted education. It’s another sign of America’s inattention to its high-ability learners, especially those from disadvantaged circumstances. That neglect is what triggered the publication of our new book, Failing Our Brightest Kids: The Global Challenge of Educating High-Ability Students. All sorts of data—from the National Assessment of Educational Progress, from research studies like the 2011 Fordham Institute report “Do High Flyers Maintain Their Altitude? Performance Trends of Top Students,” and from elsewhere—have shown that high-achievers made smaller gains in the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) era than did low-achievers. Policy efforts that raised the floor and eased the achievement gap did so at the expense of strong students, who were already nudging the ceiling. Under NCLB, schools and teachers had scant incentive to work hard with kids who were already “proficient.” And so they didn’t—especially in places full of poor and minority kids, many of whom needed extra help to become proficient.

At the same time, data from international measures such as the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) make painfully clear that the United States isn’t pushing nearly as many of its young people to higher scores as are our competitor nations. These include not just the “Asian tigers,” but also Canada and a number of European countries (see Figure 1). Although we fare better in the early grades, by the time kids are fifteen (when PISA tests them), our high-end results are anything but high.

Figure 1. Percentage of high scorers on PISA, math and science, 2012

America does an especially bad job of getting poor kids into the high-scoring ranks. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development reports PISA results by socioeconomic quartiles linked to parent occupation and education, family wealth, home educational resources, and more. This “ESCS” index is controversial. Yet the data shown in Figure 2 are both instructive and depressing. Of the twelve countries we studied, the United States surpasses only Hungary in getting lowest-quartile youngsters into the top-scoring echelons. Less than 3 percent of American students in the bottom ESCS quartile reach PISA’s top tiers in math, yet 21 percent of disadvantaged Singaporeans achieve this. And when we compare these kids to those from the top quartile, we see that a high-ESCS test-taker in the United States is eight times likelier than a low-ESCS student to be a top scorer in math. In Canada, that ratio is four to one, and in Korea and Finland, it is three to one. (Comparisons based on parents’ education show very similar gaps.)

Figure 2. Percentage of students at levels 5 or 6, PISA math, ESCS top and bottom quartiles, 2012

America’s poor kids can do so much better than most of them are doing in the today. Consider the recently publicized example of Abdisamad Adan, a Harvard freshman from Somaliland, about as poor a place as can be found on the globe. Abdisamad grew up with eighteen brothers and sisters in a small home without electricity. He caught a break when Jonathan Starr, a former hedge fund manager, started the Abaarso School of Science and Technology, a boarding school in Somaliland meant to serve the country’s brightest boys and girls. Abdisamad thrived there. He gained admission to a college preparatory school in New York—and then, impressively, to Harvard. Talk about upward mobility—this amazing story is the result of ability plus a great school designed to develop the ambitions and intellects of promising students.

Then there’s Lin-Manuel Miranda, who wrote the book, music, and lyrics for Hamilton, the Broadway smash of the moment. He also recently won one of this year’s twenty-four MacArthur Foundation “genius” awards. When Miranda’s father moved to New York as a young man, he spoke no English—but when Miranda was six, he was accepted into Hunter College Elementary School, a public school for intellectually gifted children that seeks to identify able kids from all parts of town. His first theatrical successes occurred within the Hunter College system, which cultivated his genius and created his opportunity.

Looking beyond U.S. borders, most of Failing Our Brightest Kids reports what we learned about how eleven other countries educate gifted students, based on conventional research, site visits, and on-the-ground reports. We parse the data and took advantage of expert analysis by others—especially Eric Hanushek, Paul Peterson, and Ludger Woessman. Here’s some of what we found:

• Although countries with strong overall achievement also tend to have many top scorers, the United States cannot assume that raising the water level will do enough for the gifted education boat; it’s far too small to contain all who belong in it.
• Culture matters. When parents value education and push their kids, it makes a difference. Where competition is appreciated rather than shunned, more kids push themselves. (That’s what’s been so great—and rare—about the Science Talent Search.)
• Policy matters too. No Child Left Behind makes it essentially impossible for states to test kids on “out of grade level” material, a policy intended to prevent the tests from being dumbed down for low-achievers. The notion is benevolent, sure, but this policy also makes it impossible for states to truly track academic gains by high-achievers. A provision in the House and Senate reauthorization bills would solve this problem—at least, it would void the current ban—but this is not yet law.
• Waiting for high school to beef up the offerings for high-ability kids is a mistake, particularly for smart students from disadvantaged circumstances who depend on the school system from day one to help them realize their potential.
• “Differentiated instruction” sounds great, but in the end, it’s no substitute for separate learning opportunities, supplements, acceleration, and enrichment programs. Rare is the teacher who can do right by her ablest pupils at the same time she provides slower learners the attention that they need.

After digesting what we learned, we issued a number of recommendations for how we could do a better job.

Perhaps most important, we need to get this topic back onto the policy agenda and rekindle the debate about a society that prizes excellence as well as equity.

We should conduct universal ability screening. Almost every U.S. public school student now takes state exams in (at least) reading and math from third grade on. Let’s identify, say, the 5 percent with the highest scores in a school, district, or state in third or fourth grade, much as Singapore and Western Australia do. Instead of using IQ or aptitude tests like they do, however, we should use existing—and universal—achievement metrics, then supplement their ranks with kids whose promise is spotted by their teachers.

Student progress should be based on mastery. The single best thing our education system could do for high-ability students (and everybody else) would be to enable them to move through their curricula at their own pace. Instead of age-based grade levels—placing all eleven-year-olds in fifth grade and holding them to the same performance standards—let students proceed on the basis of mastery, one unit or module at a time, subject by subject, with no obligation for all to move at the same rate.

Besides allowing for acceleration, schools and districts should encourage flexible ability grouping within classrooms, multi-age and multi-grade groupings, the use of technology for “blended learning,” and whatever else they can to facilitate the educational individualization that we already demand for disabled children.

We should not be afraid of separate classrooms, after-school and summer programs, and even separate schools for high-achievers. Places like the Bronx High School of Science and Virginia’s Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology are educational treasures. But we don’t have enough of them—and we almost never provide their equivalent for elementary and middle school students, which would do much to launch more high-ability poor kids on a trajectory to success.

It’s unfashionable, even politically incorrect, to push for better education for smart kids. One can easily be labeled elitist and swiftly admonished that attention and resources should focus laser-like on the “truly needy.” But plenty of smart kids are also needy, especially those without middle class families and suburban guidance counselors to help them navigate the turbulent waters of American K?12 education. And the country itself is needy: It’s in need of more top-flight scientists, inventors, and entrepreneurs to ensure its future security, prosperity, and competitiveness—which is exactly why Intel’s suspension of its Science Talent Search sponsorship is so shameful.

Former University of Michigan president Mary Sue Coleman was a finalist in that competition in 1961. “It was the Sputnik generation, when America was competing with Russia to get into space,” she recently told the International Business Times. “It was a national obsession. People in school cheered us on like we were star athletes. I got letters from the heads of corporations.”

Shame on Intel for pulling the plug and making matters worse. But shame on all of us for neglecting millions of young people who deserve better—and who have the potential to do great things for their country as well as for themselves.

Editor’s note: This post originally appeared in a slightly different form at Education Next.

Fuse/Thinkstock

The next batch of results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is due on October 28. Pundits of all persuasions are gearing up to jump on the news and promote their spin. But that’s for amateurs, I say. Why wait for regular old mis-NAEP-ery when you can practice pre-NAEP-ery?

Rumors abound that the news is going to be bad, with scores down nationally and in a bunch of states. That will be used as fodder to attack Common Core, teacher evaluations, charter schools, or whatever else you happen not to like that’s prominent in today’s education policy conversation.

But let me suggest that journalists and editorialists consider the most likely explanation: It’s the economy, stupid. While those of us in education reform are working hard to make sure that demography does not equal destiny, we must also acknowledge the strong link between students’ socioeconomic status and their academic achievement (a link that some amazing schools are weakening).

In fact, the last time we saw national declines in NAEP scores was in the aftermath of the 1990 recession. That was particularly the case for reading. It makes sense—when families are hurting financially, it’s harder for students to focus on learning.

And let’s be clear: The American family has gotten hammered in recent years. Adjusted for inflation, the national median income for families with children dropped 6 percent from 2006 to 2014. In many states, it was much worse:

Change in Median Income of Families with Children: 2006–2014

Note: Data are from Kids Count; I then used the Bureau of Labor Statistics’s inflation adjuster calculator to determine inflation-adjusted income.

So if I were a betting man, I’d wager that the states with big declines in median income are going to be the ones showing lower NAEP scores this time around. And the handful of places that have weathered the recession—or even thrived—are going to come out looking pretty good. (Washington, D.C.: Here’s looking at you, kid.)

We’ll know in a week if I’m right. 

Nastco/iStock/Thinkstock

• When the Los Angeles Board of Education voted to fire fifth-grade teacher Rafe Esquith last week over allegations of sexual misconduct, its members were doubtless aware of the potential for blowback. Esquith, whose myriad awards and world-renowned classroom productions of Shakespeare have made him the district’s most recognizable employee, can count influential friends both inside and outside the school system. And the circumstances of his termination—decided by a closed-door tribunal following an extensive investigation into his private life—do not argue in its favor. Now Esquith’s attorneys have filed a $1 billion class-action lawsuit against the district on behalf of thousands of teachers, claiming that they were targeted for dismissal because of their age and pending retirement windfalls. The accusations lodged against Esquith are ill defined, but serious. If accurate, they are surely serious enough to merit public examination of his record and methods. But if, as some prominent supporters claim, the investigation was a panicked overcorrection in response to earlier scandals, this story could become more bizarre and tragic than it has already. Either way, this is a disciplinary process in dire need of greater transparency.
• The saddest and most illuminating thing you’ll read all week is this long-form Washington Post profile of the plight of impoverished high school graduates in the Deep South. Reporter Chico Harlan spent months with ninteteen-year-old Jadareous Davis, a recent graduate trapped by the social and institutional pathologies of economically depressed Drew, Mississippi. Davis, who squeaked through one of the worst high schools in the state, watches in horror as the pride of his commencement ceremony gives way to unemployment and family dysfunction. He finds a modicum of hope in vocational training, but odds this steep should never weigh against a kid fresh from his senior prom. The United States as a whole, and this region most especially, must come to grips with its inequities and embrace a full program of upward mobility—before more young people are doomed to the same hell.
• The lecture is dead, long live the lecture! Over the weekend, Molly Worthen, an assistant professor at UNC-Chapel Hill, penned an op-ed for the New York Times’s Sunday Review defending the lecture—the beleaguered teaching method we all skipped or slept through in our riotous college days. The favored alternative is “active learning,” which is so strongly backed that educators like Harvard physicist Eric Mazur have opined that lectures might even be “unethical.” And in the hard sciences, Mazur may have a point. Mixing chemicals in the orgo lab and observing kinematics in the physics lab really does deepen understanding and raise scores. But in the humanities, Worthen argues that lectures—in which experts build arguments instead of reciting encyclopedia entries—are still the best way to educate students, especially when paired with smaller discussion sections. “Absorbing a long, complex argument is hard work, requiring students to synthesize, organize, and react as they listen,” she argues. And in the 140-character, six-second age, students have little experience with such prolonged exchanges. They ought to gain some, and maybe lectures can help.

Intel’s withdrawal of its Science Talent Search sponsorship, the legitimacy of the “Asian advantage,” charter school policy’s importance to voters, and principals’ opinions of Teach For America alumni.  

Amber's Research Minute

SOURCE: Mollie Rudnick, Amanda F Edelman, Ujwal Kharel, and Matthew W. Lewis, "Results from the Teach For America 2015 National Principal Survey," RAND Corporation (October 2015).

Transcript

Alyssa :                                     Hello, this your host Alyssa Schwenk of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, here at The Education Gadfly show and  online at edexcellence.net. Now, please join me in welcoming my co-host, the J.J. Abrams of education reform, Brandon Wright.

Brandon:                                 Good one. Cool, cool, yeah.

Alyssa :                                     Initially, it was actually going to be an Adele reference, since Adele is dropping a new album, but I thought you might have ...

Brandon:                                 Adele's good too.

Alyssa :                                     Right, but I thought you might have more to say about the new ... It's Star Wars, right?

Brandon:                                 I actually just saw that, like ten minutes ago, I read that the Star Wars tickets went on pre-sale.

Alyssa :                                     Mm-hmm (affirmative)

Brandon:                                 They broke a record for pre-sale, which was previously held by The Hunger Games.

Alyssa :                                     That's a great movie.

Brandon:                                 It didn't just break it, it's already sold like eight times more than The Hunger Games did. It's already sold out like 16,000 screens or something? The movies doesn't come out, by the way, til December 18th.

Alyssa :                                     That's insane, right?

Brandon:                                 Rabid following. I'm excited about it though.

Alyssa :                                     I admit to not being a huge Star Wars fan, but I got to respect. This many people coming out, hopefully it's going to be a good show.

Brandon:                                 I like Lost, and I liked his two Star Trek films and, I think he'll do a good job.

Alyssa :                                     I have many opins on Lost, but that would be an entirely different podcast and take like, three hours.

Brandon:                                 Sure, sure.

Alyssa :                                     Let's just skip ahead to Pardon the Gadfly. Clara, first question.

Clara:                                        Intel will withdraw its support of the Science Talent Search, but will continue to fund Maker Faire and MakerCon. What does this mean for STEM Education?

Alyssa :                                     Brandon?

Brandon:                                 I think STEM Education will be fine. I think it's good that they're sticking with the other two.

Alyssa :                                     Mm-hmm (affirmative)

Brandon:                                 I kind of wish they would stick with all three, I guess. I think the Science Talent Search will be fine. I think they'll find another sponsor.

Alyssa :                                     Mm-hmm (affirmative)

Brandon:                                 I guess I wish Intel would've pulled out with kind of a replacement in mind, or, lined up. I just don't like the kind of trend of moving away from something I think, that's as important as the Science Talent Search. There just aren't very many of these kind of Science fair competitions that the U.S. does.

Alyssa :                                     Right. I think it's more symbolic than actual. The kids who do STS, I don't think are representative of kids nationwide and the Science education the kids nationwide receive. That being said, I think it's hugely important for kids who have an interest in research, that this be cultivated. I think the Maker Faire, it does the same thing, but in a very different direction? It's kind of geared towards the same kids, the same types of kids seem to participate. I don't think it's necessarily representative of where Science education in America is going, but I do see it kind of as, these are the skills that we as tech firms value. We want kids who can hack and build and create things, and take things apart, which is not the type of Science that STS necessarily promotes. That being said, I do think, there always needs to be more offerings for gifted kids in Science. There are so few already.

Brandon:                                 Mm-hmm (affirmative) I agree.

Alyssa :                                     Yeah.

Brandon:                                 I agree.

Alyssa :                                     It should be interesting.

Brandon:                                 Indeed.

Alyssa :                                     Question two.

Female:                                   Several articles last week focused on the so-called "Asian Advantage", that allows Asian Americans students to excel in school. Do you buy this argument, and how broadly does it apply?

Alyssa :                                     I do not buy this argument. I do not think it applies very broadly. I certainly do think though ... And Brandon, feel free to push back ... That, certain aspects of parenting and certain aspects of learning that, Asian families and Asian culture might promote do tend to have stronger outcomes. Something ... This was brought on by a NicK Kristof article entitled the "Asian Advantage" ... And, a lot of things that he brings up, two parent households and emphasis on education, an emphasis on self-discipline, those are going to create advantages for any kid who implements them.

                                                      At the same time, I don't think that, when we say the Asian Advantage, we're talking about all Asian students. We're focusing on Chinese Americans students, or perhaps Indian American students. I think saying that all Asian American students excel in school, kind of obfuscates some achievement gaps and opportunity gaps that we're going to see within the whole pantheon of Asian American students. I think that's an important distinction to make.

Brandon:                                 Sure. Yeah, I think what we're really talking about here is culture. It's culture that's kind of brought over from these different Asian countries, the majority of which actually do really, really well. Even the ones that tend to be a little less affluent. They kind of have an approach to education, and kind of smart kids, that holds that the kids who get the best grades aren't the smartest. They just work the hardest. Whereas, Americans tend to think that the kids who get the best grades are the smartest. Kristof makes a good point. It's probably somewhere in between those two things.

                                                      I think culture's really hard to change, and I think there is a legitimate difference here. A legitimate cultural influence that does push these kids' grades up. At the same time, I don't think culture's impossible to change, and I think we can take some of these things, or take some the things these countries do, like kind of put kids into different schools based on exam scores at like a high school age. Universally screen kids when they're in elementary school, and continue to do that. Still, I don't really know how you change American culture. I guess we could try to get people to care less about the football team, and care more about things like the Science Talent Search.

Alyssa :                                     You never see a Michigan fan ...

Brandon:                                 I think that's a little hopeful.

Alyssa :                                     I feel like that's hard for you to say.

Brandon:                                 It's not hard for me to say after Saturday. I don't know if you saw the game on Saturday.

Alyssa :                                     Sprortsing, Brandon, sportsing.

Brandon:                                 I'll quickly tell you, because it is worth talking about.

Alyssa :                                     Here we go.

Brandon:                                 Michigan was going to beat State, and they had ten seconds to go. They were punting from the 50-yard line. Ten seconds, all they had to do was punt the ball and they would win. They fumbled the punt, and State ran it all the way back and scored with no time left, to beat Michigan. It was like the worst thing I've ever seen on a football field, so I'm okay not caring about football after this weekend. A bit of a tangent.

Alyssa :                                     Not caring, or you can't care anymore?

Brandon:                                 I will continue to care, but I'm trying not to think about it.

Alyssa :                                     Okay.

Brandon:                                 I'm trying not to think about it.

Alyssa :                                     Reading a couple of these articles reminded me of last year, when everyone's favorite tiger mom, Amy Chua, came out with a book. I think it was "The Triple Threat" or "The Triple Package". It was something that ...

Brandon:                                 Triple Package, yeah.

Alyssa :                                     Made me think of Disney stars of yore, yes.

Brandon:                                 I reviewed it when I was ...

Alyssa :                                     Did any of the insights she had about cultures where certain traits are valued resonate, as you were either looking over these articles this week, or doing your research into the books that you and Checker just published?

Brandon:                                 I didn't really think about it at the time, but yeah, there's definitely overlap there. We definitely talk about culture in our book. I don't really know how you change it. If you do, it would be over a very long period of time.

Alyssa :                                     Right.

Brandon:                                 Yeah. I'm not sure it's ... It's a stuff nut to crack.

Alyssa :                                     It certainly is. Okay, onto another tough nut. This next question's a doozy. Clara?

Clara:                                        Charter schools have become a divisive issue in many major U.S. cities. Could a parent's preference for district or charter schools predict how they vote in the 2016 election?

Alyssa :                                     I'm going to take this question and parse, "What do we mean by 2016 election?" I think there are two different answers. The education post had a really interesting article, that just recently came out, looking at why education isn't more of a voting issue that people really make their decisions about in national elections. I don't think, if you look at the national election that, whoever it comes down to on the Democratic side and the Republican side, that education is going to be one of those issues. I think, we've seen it not get that much play in debates, are on ISIS. There are a lot of things that you can ask a presidential candidate about. I do think that education is a voting issue in a lot of elections. I think over the next two years we're going to see it emerge in some really strange and interesting ways in a couple of local races.

Brandon:                                 Yeah, I think it comes down to who really has control over schools. That's people at the district, the city, state, et cetera. I do wish that education was talked about more presidentially.

Alyssa :                                     That's for sure.

Brandon:                                 Right. Some of our colleagues make arguments about the "bully pulpit", kind of signalling to Americans and to there party the direction that they think education should go. As a leader of the country, I think that's important. At the same time, I don't really think it's going to decide many people's votes.

Alyssa :                                     Yeah.

Brandon:                                 There are bigger issues, and issues that the president influences directly.

Alyssa :                                     Yeah. Education is one of those issues where, it's not necessarily like, you're Republican, this is your party line. You're a Democrat, this is your party line. It's one of those issues where, you can be a liberal, but certainly support a lot of education reform platforms that have been on the Republican agenda. Or you can be on the right, and support some things that are coming kind of more traditionally from the left. It's one of those kind of confusing issues. I know when I talk about being in education, a lot of my friends are surprised, and see a lot of my views as conflicting.

Brandon:                                 Yeah. There're definitely a lot of people on the left, and it's obvious but, our office is about ed reform, right?

Alyssa :                                     Right.

Brandon:                                 Yeah. I think you're exactly right.

Alyssa :                                     Yeah. I think we've had eight years of President Obama and Arne Duncan, and now John King, which have been a pretty reform, liberal agenda. Richard Whitmire had a great piece in USA Today recently, about how that might change and how there's this schism in Democratic education politics. I don't think it's necessarily news to anyone who's been around the block. Certainly, Democrats for Education Reform, Andy Rotherham. a lot of people on the left have been writing about reform issues in a way that don't necessarily align with party platforms. I do think it's a very interesting thing, that's going to develop over the next couple of years and become more prominent. Since Hillary Clinton does not quite ... As far as we can tell, as far as she's messaged ... Align with what President Obama has done in office.

Brandon:                                 Right. I agree.

Alyssa :                                     Should be interesting. Let's come back to that question in about a year. I think that's all of the time we have for Pardon the Gadfly today. Up next, Amber's research minute.

Alyssa :                                     Hi David.

David:                                       Hi Alyssa, good to be here.

Alyssa :                                     How's it going?

David:                                       It's going well.

Alyssa :                                     We were discussing earlier ... And I know you're going to have a lot of opinions about this ... J.J. Abrams and Star Wars.

David:                                       Yes. My opinion is, can't it come out already?

Alyssa :                                     Yeah, so you actually got me earlier today. We were discussing the first set. I'm clearly choking over myself here.

David:                                       I was explaining the difference between an ewok and a wookiee.

Alyssa :                                     They are not related.

David:                                       We figured that out eventually, yes.

Alyssa :                                     Here's where I tripped up, and Audrey actually agrees with me. I was discussing this with her earlier. Ewok and wookiee sound related, so one of them could be a diminutive of the other. Not unlike cat and kitten. It was a linguistic thing.

David:                                       I got ya. Maybe I can get you a pet ewok for Christmas or something.

Alyssa :                                     Last year I got a Mickey Mouse chia pet, so I'll just add it to the collection.

David:                                       Yeah okay, sounds good.

Alyssa :                                     Okay. Moving on, what do you got for us today?

David:                                       All right. Today, we'll be discussing the Teach For America 2015 National Principal Survey, which was conducted by the RAND Corporation earlier this year. In this survey, which was last administered in 2013, RAND asked the 3,000 plus principals who currently have TFA core members at their schools, about their views on those core members. Roughly 1800 of these principals, or about 54 percent, responded. On average, these principals were less experienced, more racially and ethnically diverse, than the average American principal. They were much, much, more likely to run a charter school. However, only 12 percent of the respondents were TFA alumni, having gone through the program themselves.

                                                      In general, the results of the survey suggest that principals who work with TFA members view them positively. In particular, 80 percent of those surveyed said they were satisfied with core members at their schools, and 86 percent said they would be willing to hire another TFA core member. Sixty-six percent said they would definitely recommend doing so, to a fellow school leader. A majority of principals also said that TFA core members were at least as proficient as other novice teachers at their schools, across a range of skills. Like developing positive relationships with colleagues. Having high expectations, et cetera.

                                                      Then finally, 87 percent of principals said they were satisfied with the support TFA was providing it's core members, and three quarters said it complimented their own school's induction or training. Despite these positive findings however, two areas stood out as potentially problematic. Neither of which will come as a hugh surprise to our listeners. The first problematic area was classroom management, which half of respondents identified as a reason not to hire additional TFA core members. The second was, the oft criticized two-year commitment, which 57 percent of principals identified as a disincentive to hire.

                                                      Interestingly, both TFA alumni and principals of charter schools, viewed TFA core members and the program in general, more negatively than principals at traditional district high schools did. For example, both TFA alums and principals in charter schools, said core members subject matter expertise was lower, and they were less satisfied with TFA's ongoing support. Although despite these misgivings, charter school principals were more likely to say that they would hire additional TFA core members. Maybe because they face fewer hiring restrictions, or have less money with which to work, making this a more attractive option.

                                                      Obviously, some of these differences could reflect different expectations. Then again, some of them might be grounded in reality. Maybe novice teachers in general are more knowledgeable at charter schools, making TFA core members seem less knowledgeable by comparison. It's tough to say. Anyway, this survey isn't going to answer those sorts of questions, but it does point to some pretty important issues and findings that may seem counter-intuitive. First of all, principals at traditional schools are pretty satisfied with TFA, but principals at charter schools are less so. Not something that most people would expect, I think. Then second, and less surprisingly I guess, some of the big issues are still there. Particularly, classroom management and the issue of turnover, which is sort of evergreen. Let's get down to it.

Alyssa :                                     All right, very interesting. As an alum of TFA, a proud one, I'm heartened to hear that we are continuing to do well. What was interesting to me, is what you pointed out about charter school principals and alums being less satisfied. I don't know. Do you think that's an issue of higher expectations? If you're leading a KIPP school, you want each and every teacher to bring an A game, or do you think it's more of a like, "back in my day"? "When we were an alum, we were smarter, we were better prepared", et cetera.

David:                                       I think it's a little bit more of the former.

Alyssa :                                     Okay.

David:                                       I think that they ... Well, I suspect. This is all speculation ... But, it wouldn't shock me, if alums at least, felt unprepared when they were TFAers?

Alyssa :                                     Wait, wait, tell me more about that.

David:                                       Maybe they viewed the current TFAers as similarly unprepared. Then again, maybe all new teachers are unprepared. I don't know. To me, the interesting part was that they were still less likely ... Charter school principals ... Were still more likely rather, to hire TFA folks, even though they viewed them more negatively. I think that says something important about sort of, the job of a charter school principal versus a traditional teacher, traditional principal rather. They have less money to work with, and they have the option of hiring two TFAers on the cheap, perhaps. As opposed to paying one 30-year veteran a lot of money. Regardless of how you feel about that, I think it's interesting.

Alyssa :                                     Do you think that these principals, based on the context they're working in, either as a charter school principal or a district school principal, might have different ways of approaching TFA core members that would lead to those differing opinions of TFA core members?

David:                                       Yeah. I think there's an obvious cultural differences here, but it's pretty difficult to tease out from this survey alone. I'd love to see some sort of follow up survey done by TFA, of just charter school principals who hire TFA core members, and how they view them specifically, and what would lead them to make that decision, as opposed to hiring a different teacher.

Alyssa :                                     Yeah, I think it's certainly interesting when you're talking about a high performing charter network, like a KIPP or an Uncommon or something, where even if the principal didn't come through TFA him or herself, they're used to really highly performing teachers. In comparison, a really highly performing but novice teacher, might not shine as brightly as they would in a more traditional school or a school that's just less intense. Do you know if they broke it out by high performing charters, versus all charters, versus district, or just charter schools, lump sum?

David:                                       I can tell you definitively that they did not break it out.

Alyssa :                                     As alumni of charter schools in Washington, D.C., I think we can say that there is a widespread of quality within charter schools.

David:                                       And a widespread of type.

Alyssa :                                     Certainly a fascinating study. Certainly a lot more to explore, but definitely a really interesting piece of research, that we hope you'll all check out. All right, and that's actually all the time we have for the entire Gadfly show. Til next week ...

Brandon:                                 I'm Brandon Wright.

Alyssa :                                     I'm Alyssa Schwenk, for the Thomas B. Fordham Institute signing off.

The French mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal famously posited that whether or not one believes in God, it behooves us to behave as if he exists. What have you got to lose? If you’re right, you wind up heaven and spare yourself eternal punishment in hell. And if not, well, what did it cost you apart from a few earthly pleasures here and there? Pascal’s Wager basically suggests that your upside is infinite, while your downside is relatively small. So do the right thing.

We need a Pascal’s Wager of curriculum. Schools are going to teach something, so it behooves us to ensure that the textbooks, workbooks, and software we put in front of students are coherent and of high quality. As this report from the Center for American Progress shows, crappy curriculum costs every bit as much as the good stuff. The authors found “little relationship” between the cost and quality of instructional products. And switching to a more rigorous math curriculum, for example, can deliver far greater returns on investment than other reforms. “The average cost-effectiveness ratio of switching curriculum was almost forty times that of class-size reduction in a well known randomized experiment,” the report notes.

Every opportunity for schools getting more bang for their curricular buck is a function of choosing the right product, not finding a better price. But for these cost-neutral benefits to accrue, we have to start taking curriculum seriously as a reform lever—at least as seriously as teacher quality, chartering, and other pet reform ideas, none of which have the demonstrated upside of simply choosing curriculum wisely and implementing it well. In short, we have a lot more empirical evidence for curricular effects than Pascal had for God. “In education, it is rare for a reform to show strong outcomes and be relatively inexpensive,” the authors conclude. “Curriculum reform is both cost-effective and worthwhile and should become a more central part of the effort to improve the nation’s schools.” Amen.

For starters, better “product research” is needed, including more “randomized experiments that clearly show which curricula produce the largest achievement gains.” Boser, Chingos, and Straus are also correct to argue that “when hard evidence on curriculum quality is available, it should supersede the often vague impressions of stakeholder groups that frequently dominate the [adoption] process.” Finally, let me add a recommendation of my own: Education reformers need to get over their blithe indifference on this issue. Some leading-edge reform outfits like KIPP and Achievement First have been quietly coming around, and Common Core itself is predicated on smart curricular choices. But more is needed to usher in an age of enlightenment. Of course teacher quality matters. It will matter even more when teachers are using materials of proven quality.

What have we got to lose? 

SOURCE: Ulrich Boser, Matthew Chingos, and Chelsea Straus, “The Hidden Value of Curriculum Reform: Do States and Districts Receive the Most Bang for Their Curriculum Buck?,” Center for American Progress (October 2015).

The relationship between teacher experience and quality has been widely studied, as has the relationship between teacher experience and salary. The relationship between experience and total compensation—which includes both salary and retirement benefits—is often overlooked. In a new report, researchers from the Manhattan Institute have thrown open the curtains by calculating the total compensation for teachers with master’s degrees and varying years of experience in the country’s ten largest public school systems. They explain that, although the preponderance of research demonstrates that quality differences between teachers based upon experience tend to plateau after 5–7 years, most public school teachers still earn salaries according to fixed schedules that are based entirely on years of experience and advanced degrees. Retirement benefits are distributed in a similar way. Approximately 89 percent of public school teachers earn retirement benefits under final-average-salary-defined benefit (FAS-DB) pension plans, meaning that teachers earn a lifetime annuity available only after they reach their respective plans’ thresholds. These thresholds, like a salary schedule, are based on a combination of age and years of service. As a result, FAS-DB plans often backload retirement benefits.

The scale of backloading varies across plans. In New York City, for example, a teacher earns an average of only $1,031 in retirement compensation during each of her first fifteen years; in each of the ensuing years, she earns an average of $16,908. In Philadelphia, teachers vest after ten years, which is the same year they reach the “maximum rung” on the salary ladder; however, they earn no positive retirement compensation until year seventeen, and their retirement benefits aren’t maximized until they reach thirty-five years of service. The authors point out that this causes significant problems for the large majority of public school teachers who leave teaching before they reach the sufficient years of service mark (not to mention teachers who are mobile throughout their careers). They also note that backloaded plans harm teachers who remain in the classroom after their specified retirement age. For these teachers, retirement compensation actually turns negative during the later years of their careers, making it financially wise for them to leave public schools. Overall, the report finds that backloaded pension plans “substantially increase the total compensation premium paid to highly experienced teachers who remain in the same school district their entire careers.”

Fortunately, there seems to be a solution: The report outlines an alternative model called a “cash-balance” (CB) pension plan, which allows teachers to more smoothly accrue pension benefits throughout their careers. The CB plan better aligns teacher compensation with teacher quality by “raising compensation for teachers in their early years—a time when teachers improve most dramatically.” The CB plan doesn’t link retirement plans to measurable teacher performance; it simply reallocates teachers’ retirement compensation more smoothly from the beginning to the end of their careers. Furthermore, the researchers found that for the ten school districts they studied, changing from a backloaded plan to a CB plan would be of equal cost to taxpayers and would reduce the teacher experience premium without reducing a teacher’s total expected career compensation. Sounds like a win for everybody.

SOURCE: Josh B. McGee and Marcus A Winters, “Rewarding Experienced Teachers: How Much Do Schools Really Pay?,” Manhattan Institute (October 2015).

Nearly everyone agrees that high-quality pre-kindergarten is a worthy investment. Calls to expand it at public expense stem from a handful of well-known (and very costly) intensive models that appeared to deliver long-term positive effects for poor children: improved school readiness, increased graduation rates, and even the mitigation of risk factors like teen pregnancy and incarceration. These oft-cited outcomes are compelling. So is the urge to level the playing field for children who arrive at school with a thirty million word gap. But an actionable definition of “high quality” remains elusive, and studies of large, scaled-up pre-K programs have shown mixed results.

This study from Vanderbilt University’s Peabody Research Institute adds valuable evidence to the discussion of whether, when, and how pre-kindergarten is a worthy investment. In 2009, in conjunction with the Tennessee Department of Education, the institute launched a rigorous study of the state’s voluntary pre-kindergarten program (TN-VPK). It’s a full-day program that targets exceptionally at-risk four-year-olds; researchers tracked two cohorts of children through the end of their third-grade years. Oversubscribed programs enabled a random design whereby children enrolled in TN-VPK were the treatment group and those waitlisted (and ultimately not admitted) became the control group. The study is one of a few randomized control trials of a large-scale pre-K program (most comparable studies employ less rigorous research designs) and the first ever of a state-funded, targeted program.

Findings reported last month come from a subset of the overall study’s sample (specifically the 1,076 children whose parents agreed to annual data collection: 773 participants in TN-VPK and 303 non-participants). Although this leaves something to be desired from a randomization perspective, the authors report that “the consented children…were generally representative of those in the full randomized sample.” Researchers sought to answer three questions. First, would TN-VPK prepare children for kindergarten (in both academic and non-cognitive ways)? Second, would certain subgroups benefit more than others? And third, would effects on achievement and behavior last beyond kindergarten?

To gauge the program’s immediate impact, children were assessed on several academic indicators (via achievement tests) and non-cognitive behaviors (via teacher ratings), both before and after they took part in the program. At the end of the pre-K year, researchers found that TN-VPK had a significant positive effect on children on six achievement subtests, with especially large effects in two literacy measures. The effect size for the composite achievement score was .32—a figure that, according to researchers, is “larger than average” for the pre-K programs studied in the last three decades. The program had the greatest impact on children who were English language learners and/or whose mothers had attained less than a high school degree.

But don’t uncork the champagne. To see if the program’s effects persisted, the children were also assessed and received teacher ratings at the end of each school year (through third grade). Not only did the positive effects of TN-VPK wear off by the end of kindergarten, but they had turned negative by the end of second grade—that is, TN-VPK children scored lower than non-participants on all achievement measures (with most of those comparisons being statistically significant). This reversal occurred even earlier on behavioral effects: By the end of first grade, TN-VPK participants were rated by teachers as having worse work skills and being less prepared for school. Comparable studies of many pre-K programs have discovered a gradual “fadeout” of positive effects once children enter the K–12 system. But the long-term negative impacts discovered by Vanderbilt’s researchers were quite unexpected, and they prompted the authors to urge caution on those who interpret their findings.

So what do we make of this? It’s important to note that children in the control group didn’t receive no treatment—just treatment that wasn’t TN-VPK. Twenty-seven percent of the control group attended Head Start or a private childcare center; the rest received care at home (the quality and details of which are impossible to track). Their alternative early learning experiences may not have prepared them as well for kindergarten as TN-VPK, but that ended up not mattering by the start of first grade. One way of looking at it is that Head Start, private preschools, home providers, and families are setting children up for K–3 success at least as well as (and possibly better than) the state-funded program, which costs $90 million annually.

It’s also important to consider that the “fadeout” of pre-K observed in this study and many others may not be the fault entirely of the pre-K programs. It’s possible that pre-K participants entering kindergarten ahead of their peers are neglected somewhat by teachers, who focus instead on youngsters in the most dire academic need—an understandable but still damaging method of triage. Teachers must capitalize on and sustain student gains made prior to their entry, and also meet the needs of kids who are kindergarten-ready.

Finally, the study calls into question what constitutes “high quality” pre-K. Responses and reactions (sometimes overreactions) to the report were swift, motivating two of the study’s authors to pen a follow-up article. “The virtual ink on our recently released report was barely dry before pre-K advocates were vigorously building a firebreak around these results,” they wrote, “contending that they are not representative of the effects of state pre-K programs generally and stem entirely from the unusually poor quality of the Tennessee program.” Defending Tennessee, they note that TN-VPK is no different from programs being ramped up in other states. It aligns with nine of the ten benchmarks provided by the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER). TN-VPK participating districts had all the right inputs: teachers with licenses in early childhood and education, classrooms with an adult-student ratio of 1:10, maximum class sizes of twenty, and state board-approved curricula. This assertion makes the report’s findings even grimmer and adds new urgency for how we reach the most at-risk early learners. If Tennessee’s statewide pre-K program aligns to the best consensus we have on what matters in pre-K, and it is comparable to rapidly expanding programs around the country, we need to rethink the benchmarks for quality. Moreover, for a program to be of truly high quality for at-risk children, it must go beyond a one-year effort at age four.

SOURCE: Mark W. Lipsey, Dale C. Farran, Kerry G. Hofer, “A Randomized Control Trial of a Statewide Voluntary Prekindergarten Program on Children’s Skills and Behaviors through Third Grade,” Peabody Research Institute at Vanderbilt University (September 2015).

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