The Education Gadfly Weekly

Richard Vedder, AEI PressJune 200

Economist Richard Vedder wrote, and the American Enterprise Institute Press has just published, this fine book-length analysis of college costs, the reasons they have risen so much, and what can be done about it. In a nutshell, he finds U.S. colleges and universities deeply inefficient and unproductive places that pass along most of these weaknesses to their clients (and taxpayers) via rising tuitions and appropriations. He suggests a number of possible remedies, every one of which will outrage the mandarins of American higher education but almost all of which deserve respectful attention from state and federal policy makers. He examines both tuition-related issues and the (mixed and not entirely persuasive) case for public subsidies. "A good case can be made," Vedder writes, "that governments should largely get out of the higher education business, ending state subsidies and tax advantages for private donations. Moreover, the evidence is strong that massive governmental infusions of funds, along with tax-sheltered private contributions, have contributed to the cost explosion in higher education." Though higher ed is not Gadfly's usual beat, this is an important book that should have been written a decade ago and that Congress ought take very seriously when, next year, it starts afresh to renew the Higher Education Act. It weighs in at 260 pages, the list price is $25, the ISBN is 0844741973, and you can obtain additional information by clicking here.

Harold C. Doran and Lance T. Izumi, Pacific Research InstituteJune 2004

Like most states, California's current assessment system lacks value-added measures. Rather than tracking test scores of individual students over time to gauge learning gains each year, most states take "snap-shots" of class and school averages, a method that can neither account for changes in student populations (is a school really doing better if this year's fourth graders score better than last year's fourth graders?) nor measure a student's learning each year (a single score reflects a lifetime of learning, not just one year). Equally problematic, California's system, like others, tracks the proportion of students meeting proficiency targets; this ignores gains, or the lack thereof, made by students well above or below the proficiency cutoff (akin to "measuring a child's height with a yardstick but acknowledging growth only when his or her height exceeds 36 inches"). To rectify these problems, California legislated in 2002 that the Department of Education seek proposals for a student achievement tracking database. In 2003, it required creation of a system of unique student identification numbers and created a committee to recommend how to use these in assessment. This paper presents one potential solution: the REACH (Rate of Expected Academic Change) value-added model. It would track student achievement data over time to create a trend line, predicting how a student will fare by the end of his or her schooling compared to a "proficient" score. A student on course to reach 80 percent of proficiency would get a 0.8, while one on track to exceed the standard would score above a 1.0. Because it would track individual students, it would measure how much they gain each year relative to the end goal (proficiency). Much of this paper is technical, and you may not like its whiff of determinism, but it offers the lay reader a useful overview of value-added testing (including the Tennessee model) and of California's existing assessment system. Other value-added models besides REACH may yet be proposed for California, but for now they appear to have at least one tantalizing option on the table. To read more, click here.

U.S. Department of Education Office of the Under Secretary 2004

In 1998, Congress instructed the Education Department to conduct an independent national assessment of vocational education in time for the next reauthorization cycle of the Perkins Act. If Congress were on schedule, this report would be late, but since it seems Perkins will be back on the table in January 2005, the report is timely. Though various contractors helped with the project and an "Independent Advisory Panel" watched over it, the final report to Congress (310 pages) and executive summary (a more manageable 24 pages) were written by a staff team in the Undersecretary's office. One might, therefore, expect a tepid, bureaucratic approach. Yet while the phrasing is mild and cautious, in fact the findings and recommendations contained herein are blockbusters, at least in context of the staid world of voc ed. Eighty-five years since the Smith-Hughes Act was passed, America and its education system have changed far more than voc ed has changed, and the resulting friction begs for reform. Here are some key findings:

• "The vocational courses most high school students take improve their later earnings but have no effect on other outcomes that have become central to the mission of secondary education-such as improving academic achievement or college transitions."
• "Occupational concentrators [i.e. high-school students in the voc ed track] are far less likely than non-concentrators to be proficient in reading or math."
• "On average, vocational courses and programs do not themselves 'add value' to academic achievement. . . . Moreover, although there is mixed evidence that vocational education reduces dropping out of school, the more rigorous studies suggest there is no effect."
• "Vocational courses neither hurt nor help most students' chances of going on to college but are associated with a shift from earning a bachelor's degree to earning an associate's degree or certificate."
• "The Perkins quality improvement strategies may be too vague to drive change."
• "Tech-Prep was a catalyst for certain vocational reform activities but . . . 12 years later, few schools implement Tech-Prep as a structured program."
• "Fewer than half of postsecondary vocational participants seeking a degree or certificate take enough courses to earn a credential."
• "Flexibility provisions [in the Perkins Act] are popular but may be weakening the targeting of funds to high-poverty communities."

The authors go on to offer several reform strategies, predictably consistent with Bush administration proposals, starting with sharpening and narrowing the Perkins Act's goals and strategies; separating the secondary and postsecondary programs; eliminating Tech-Prep as a discrete program; and streamlining accountability requirements. Depending, of course, on your level of interest in voc ed, this one may be worth your while-at least the short version. You can obtain additional information and download both long and short versions here.

State Higher Education Executive Officers (SHEEO)
2004

The State Higher Education Executive Officers (SHEEO) produced this 92-page fact book dealing with the finances of higher education at the state level in 2003. It offers lots of important and sometimes counterintuitive information. For example:

• It's "superficial and premature" to conclude that state support for higher ed has been declining in recent years.
• In fact, from 1991 to 2003, per (FTE) pupil funding in public-sector institutions rose 2.1 percent faster than inflation (using a very generous higher-ed specific gauge of inflation measure). The authors make no suggestion that institutional results, effectiveness or productivity also rose during that period. Indeed, one sees here what must be termed declining productivity in U.S. higher education.
• Higher ed enrollments also continue to rise: up 19 percent between 1991 and 2003 (in public institutions).
• The share of total institutional spending (in public colleges/universities) that comes from tuition has risen too, from 26 to 33 percent.
• Not surprisingly, tuition levels (net tuition revenues per FTE student) rose 29 percent during that period, as state appropriations declined 7 percent.

Yes, tuitions are soaring. Yes, students (and parents and aid-suppliers) are bearing a larger share of the total cost of higher ed. But higher ed outlays per student are rising as well. Why? One recalls the old truism: because they can. There's no real pressure for greater efficiency.  See for yourself by surfing here. 

If a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, did it make any noise? If the nation's governors talk about education reform yet it has no effect on what they do, do the words matter? That's the question that arises from the just-concluded summer meeting of the National Governors Association.

NGA is one of the nation's most respected public policy outfits; since it purportedly represents the views of the highest state officials in the land, everyone assumes that what it says matters. But the NGA is compromised by the necessity of representing a wide range of opinions-from conservatives like Bill Owens of Colorado and Jeb Bush of Florida to liberals like Jim McGreevey of New Jersey and Rod Blagojevich of Illinois. Further, it has a new leader every year-and the two parties take turns. As a result, its position papers sometimes tend toward the oracular: weighty yet abstract, lofty and nebulous enough to lend themselves to wide interpretation. Simply put, in the interest of forging the appearance of consensus, the NGA often fudges a great many details and differences.

That doesn't mean its meetings aren't sometimes knife fights. Every governor always has his or her eye on the voters back home, as well as the special interests that can mobilize them. This means staff members-and occasionally living, breathing governors-spend hours in fierce negotiations over punctuation and turns of phrase.

This year's process was no different. What was different, and noteworthy, was the product; what the NGA ended up saying on a number of important issues. For all the caterwauling over NCLB and suchlike, we may be seeing a critical mass of governors lining up more decisively behind important education reforms. This hasn't happened since the mid 1980s. Consider:

Head Start. The NGA's revised policy on Head Start is a big improvement, though it still has some distance to go. The governors stopped short of block-granting the program, as the Bush administration proposed, but called for increased state oversight of how funds are spent and for giving states the ability to "coordinate" Head Start with their own child development programs. Better yet, the policy drops its support of "a well-developed staff training program" in favor of "quality staff." That may sound esoteric-or trivial-but the shift means something: recognition that Head Start can't simply remain a jobs program and needs to focus on improving the lamentable quality of too many Head Start employees.

Most important, the governors for the first time recognize "school readiness" as an important goal of Head Start. Obviously, that's one of those classic NGA phrases, which can mean different things to different people. But it creates space for reformers to make the argument that "school readiness" requires an explicit focus on academic basics, those vital pre-K cognitive tools such as shapes and sounds and colors. Let's hope that argument gets made. And heeded.

Civics and History. No surprise, we adore policies that start by recognizing, as this one does, the valuable contributions of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation in highlighting the woeful state of history and civics instruction in America's schools (click here for recent reports on the topic). But our admiration for this new NGA policy is not just about ego massage. This solid statement calls for "rigorous and well-developed standards" in civics, history, geography, and economics; "thorough content" and "consistent assessment" under the tutelage of teachers who are "highly qualified" as measured by "accredited coursework." We couldn't have said it better ourselves. Even better, this statement nowhere mentions "social studies," but rather gives each individual discipline comprising that tortured field its own moment in the spotlight. Eradicating that locution-and the philosophical mistakes it reflects-has been a longstanding goal of ours, concerning which we now declare victory.

Standards. The old NGA statement on standards was an embarrassment. The new one is much improved, calling for clear, concise, explicit, and accessible standards that are aligned to tests and operate within a system of accountability. Better, the NGA document embraces the findings of the American Diploma Project, which urges that high school curricula and exit standards be revised to reflect the knowledge and skills needed for modern jobs and higher education. Better yet, the new statement explicitly recognizes the achievement gap and the need for schools to graduate students who are all "academically prepared to take advantage of postsecondary opportunities." (That NGA for the first time mentions the achievement gap gives you a sense of how bad its previous statements on standards were.) 

It's heartening to learn that this statement emerged from a collaborative effort between New Jersey and Florida, states lead by governors from opposite ends of the political spectrum-a good sign that a wide swath of governors is lining up behind the standards agenda.

Charter Schools. Huzzah. The new policy replaces a weak paragraph that was buried in a longer document and clearly meant to be overlooked by everyone. This new one puts the governors, for the first time, squarely in support of charter schools, concluding that "families should have options within the public school system that will most effectively meet their children's needs" and calling for strong charter laws, adequate funding, and strict accountability for performance. It recognizes charters as one tool to narrow the achievement gap and even comes out in favor of funding charter facilities. South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford's team led the charge for this statement, with assists from Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, and California. It's a strong statement of support for charters that we hope gets heard.

Will the new verbiage make any difference? That's the crucial question and one we cannot yet answer. Any governor can ignore NGA position statements issued in his or her name. But these statements serve as a useful baseline, a common denominator of policy thinking among the nation's chief state executives. It's encouraging to realize that this week, America's governors-caveats, ambiguities, and concerns notwithstanding-put themselves on record for high standards, rigorous assessments, serious accountability, and public school choice. Now can we hold them to it?

Justin Torres is research director of the Thomas B. Fordham Foundation and a research fellow at the Hoover Institution.

Treat yourself to two fascinating features in the Chicago Tribune about a young girl who takes advantage of the NCLB transfer option to move to a new school on the North Side. Rayola has every disadvantage stacked against her: she failed third grade already, spends hours commuting across town to school, and is often absent because no one is available to get her there or her mother lets her stay up late or fails to wake her up in the morning. Still, with intensive attention, tutoring, and pluck, she does well and begins to make real academic strides. Unfortunately, her impulsive mother pulls her out of the school and sends her to a new one-her fifth in five years-that has many of the same problems as the school she originally transferred from. These two articles are both heartbreaking and heartwarming, though the reporter doesn't seem inclined to make any judgments beyond "What a mess this whole business is." We're inclined to take a more positive view. While we readily acknowledge the shortcomings of NCLB's transfer provision, the stories put a face on something we already have some evidence about-that the transfer provision can have the desired effect (see Gadfly, Volume 4, Number 17).  And yes, social obstacles, lifestyle choices and family circumstances make implementing education reforms difficult. But while there are Rayolas out there-students who can do more, if more is expected of them-it remains a moral imperative to try

"One girl's struggle to find a future," by Stephanie Banchero, Chicago Tribune, July 18, 2004 (registration required)

"Starting over," by Stephanie Banchero, Chicago Tribune, July 20, 2004 (registration required)

We earlier reported that Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney had vetoed a one-year moratorium on new charter schools, but that it looked like the General Assembly would have the two-thirds majority needed to overturn Romney's veto. (See Gadfly, Volume 4, Number 25 for more).  We're thrilled to have been wrong. This week, in what the Boston Globe calls a "rare show of solidarity" with the governor, the Massachusetts House voted 78-77 to sustain the veto. According to the Globe, lawmakers were "swayed by a plan to relieve the financial burden that charter-school funding has imposed on traditional public schools." (Specifically, opponents of the moratorium worked out a plan whereby a charter school's per-student payment would be based on the actual cost of educating that child, rather than the current method, which bases charter school funding on a per-student average in the local school district, including special education and bilingual students. It's too soon to know whether that new formula will deal a grave fiscal blow to the Bay State's existing charters.) Now charter supporters in New England must hope that the Rhode Island General Assembly will follow Massachuetts's lead. Last month, lawmakers in the Ocean State successfully slipped a charter-school moratorium into the state budget. Governor Donald L. Carcieri vetoed the budget July 1. Now the ball is back in the legislature's court. 

"Romney backed on charter schools," by Scott S. Greenberger, Boston Globe, July 21, 2004

"Rhode Island needs these experiments," Ron Wolk, Providence Journal, July 14, 2004 (registration required)

"Moratoriums on charters must go," by Julia Steiny, Providence Journal, July 11, 2004 (registration required)

Sol Stern pens a long article in City Journal on the Bush education agenda and why the President deserves the moniker "Education President." It's interesting to note, Stern recounts, that time and again opponents of various Bush initiatives seemed nonplussed (to say the least) to discover that the administration actually meant what it said. That is, the Bushies meant it when they said, Reading First funding must be used for scientifically based programs or don't expect the money. They meant it when they said that, to get Title I funding, schools and states must show sustained increases in student performance. Stern is especially gifted at thinking through the implications of NCLB: how it could open the system up to heretofore unthinkable reforms-even such as vouchers-by making the inadequacy of many schools crystal clear. (Of course, that's precisely what many "establishment" critics of NCLB fear most-and have also glimpsed as a possibility.)  Two quibbles: the piece wants a fuller discussion of some of NCLB's more glaring problems and inconsistencies. And pace Stern, achievement disaggregation by subgroup was not an idea germinated by Congressional Democrats. We're not sure why Eduwonk calls parts of the piece the "journalistic equivalent of a lap dance-some squirming and faux enthusiasm but no real payoff." In fact, we suspect Stern has shown a lot more leg than the administration would prefer when it comes to what NCLB might mean for the future.

"Yes, the Education President," by Sol Stern, City Journal, Summer 2004

More challenges loom for Hizzoner Bloomberg's controversial bid to require third graders to pass reading and math tests before advancing to the next grade (see Gadfly, Volume 4, Number 7). Lawyers from the NAACP Legal Defense Fund this week posted notices to various education listservs, fishing for plaintiffs for a lawsuit challenging the practice. (Unfortunately, the notices are not to be found on the web.) "Who are the ideal plaintiffs?" reads the notice. "African-American, Latino, Asian, and white students who scored at Level 1 on one or both of the exams . . . and were not otherwise promoted through the appeals process" and come from troubled city school districts such as Ocean Hill-Brownsville and Bedford-Stuyvesant. The attorneys want students whose grades were good enough to pass on to fourth grade but were denied because of poor scores on reading and math tests. We suspect this case is a non-starter (the courts have consistently upheld testing for purposes of determining graduation or advancement to the next level), but if it gets off the ground it's one more headache for Bloomberg and schools chancellor Joel Klein.

The New York legislature may well have overstepped its bounds this week when it passed a bill that would limit state and city universities from using the SAT or other "high-stakes tests" as major criteria for acceptance into the schools. According to the New York Post, outraged college officials are now pressing Governor Pataki to veto the bill-which was originally pushed by the City University of New York (CUNY) professors' union-because "it sets a dangerous precedent of having state politicians dictating their admissions policy." More than that, were the bill to become law, it would likely embolden K-12 anti-testing groups, who are already pushing to lift the Regents' policy requiring students to pass five exams to earn a diploma and block Mayor Bloomberg's use of standardized tests to determine whether Gotham students can be promoted beyond the third grade. (See below for more.) This is a battle with an uncertain ending, but one that is well worth watching. Stay tuned.

"State pols pass bill to end colleges' reliance on SATs," by Carl Campanile, New York Post, July 20, 2004

Harold C. Doran and Lance T. Izumi, Pacific Research InstituteJune 2004

Like most states, California's current assessment system lacks value-added measures. Rather than tracking test scores of individual students over time to gauge learning gains each year, most states take "snap-shots" of class and school averages, a method that can neither account for changes in student populations (is a school really doing better if this year's fourth graders score better than last year's fourth graders?) nor measure a student's learning each year (a single score reflects a lifetime of learning, not just one year). Equally problematic, California's system, like others, tracks the proportion of students meeting proficiency targets; this ignores gains, or the lack thereof, made by students well above or below the proficiency cutoff (akin to "measuring a child's height with a yardstick but acknowledging growth only when his or her height exceeds 36 inches"). To rectify these problems, California legislated in 2002 that the Department of Education seek proposals for a student achievement tracking database. In 2003, it required creation of a system of unique student identification numbers and created a committee to recommend how to use these in assessment. This paper presents one potential solution: the REACH (Rate of Expected Academic Change) value-added model. It would track student achievement data over time to create a trend line, predicting how a student will fare by the end of his or her schooling compared to a "proficient" score. A student on course to reach 80 percent of proficiency would get a 0.8, while one on track to exceed the standard would score above a 1.0. Because it would track individual students, it would measure how much they gain each year relative to the end goal (proficiency). Much of this paper is technical, and you may not like its whiff of determinism, but it offers the lay reader a useful overview of value-added testing (including the Tennessee model) and of California's existing assessment system. Other value-added models besides REACH may yet be proposed for California, but for now they appear to have at least one tantalizing option on the table. To read more, click here.

Richard Vedder, AEI PressJune 200

Economist Richard Vedder wrote, and the American Enterprise Institute Press has just published, this fine book-length analysis of college costs, the reasons they have risen so much, and what can be done about it. In a nutshell, he finds U.S. colleges and universities deeply inefficient and unproductive places that pass along most of these weaknesses to their clients (and taxpayers) via rising tuitions and appropriations. He suggests a number of possible remedies, every one of which will outrage the mandarins of American higher education but almost all of which deserve respectful attention from state and federal policy makers. He examines both tuition-related issues and the (mixed and not entirely persuasive) case for public subsidies. "A good case can be made," Vedder writes, "that governments should largely get out of the higher education business, ending state subsidies and tax advantages for private donations. Moreover, the evidence is strong that massive governmental infusions of funds, along with tax-sheltered private contributions, have contributed to the cost explosion in higher education." Though higher ed is not Gadfly's usual beat, this is an important book that should have been written a decade ago and that Congress ought take very seriously when, next year, it starts afresh to renew the Higher Education Act. It weighs in at 260 pages, the list price is $25, the ISBN is 0844741973, and you can obtain additional information by clicking here.

State Higher Education Executive Officers (SHEEO)
2004

The State Higher Education Executive Officers (SHEEO) produced this 92-page fact book dealing with the finances of higher education at the state level in 2003. It offers lots of important and sometimes counterintuitive information. For example:

• It's "superficial and premature" to conclude that state support for higher ed has been declining in recent years.
• In fact, from 1991 to 2003, per (FTE) pupil funding in public-sector institutions rose 2.1 percent faster than inflation (using a very generous higher-ed specific gauge of inflation measure). The authors make no suggestion that institutional results, effectiveness or productivity also rose during that period. Indeed, one sees here what must be termed declining productivity in U.S. higher education.
• Higher ed enrollments also continue to rise: up 19 percent between 1991 and 2003 (in public institutions).
• The share of total institutional spending (in public colleges/universities) that comes from tuition has risen too, from 26 to 33 percent.
• Not surprisingly, tuition levels (net tuition revenues per FTE student) rose 29 percent during that period, as state appropriations declined 7 percent.

Yes, tuitions are soaring. Yes, students (and parents and aid-suppliers) are bearing a larger share of the total cost of higher ed. But higher ed outlays per student are rising as well. Why? One recalls the old truism: because they can. There's no real pressure for greater efficiency.  See for yourself by surfing here. 

U.S. Department of Education Office of the Under Secretary 2004

In 1998, Congress instructed the Education Department to conduct an independent national assessment of vocational education in time for the next reauthorization cycle of the Perkins Act. If Congress were on schedule, this report would be late, but since it seems Perkins will be back on the table in January 2005, the report is timely. Though various contractors helped with the project and an "Independent Advisory Panel" watched over it, the final report to Congress (310 pages) and executive summary (a more manageable 24 pages) were written by a staff team in the Undersecretary's office. One might, therefore, expect a tepid, bureaucratic approach. Yet while the phrasing is mild and cautious, in fact the findings and recommendations contained herein are blockbusters, at least in context of the staid world of voc ed. Eighty-five years since the Smith-Hughes Act was passed, America and its education system have changed far more than voc ed has changed, and the resulting friction begs for reform. Here are some key findings:

• "The vocational courses most high school students take improve their later earnings but have no effect on other outcomes that have become central to the mission of secondary education-such as improving academic achievement or college transitions."
• "Occupational concentrators [i.e. high-school students in the voc ed track] are far less likely than non-concentrators to be proficient in reading or math."
• "On average, vocational courses and programs do not themselves 'add value' to academic achievement. . . . Moreover, although there is mixed evidence that vocational education reduces dropping out of school, the more rigorous studies suggest there is no effect."
• "Vocational courses neither hurt nor help most students' chances of going on to college but are associated with a shift from earning a bachelor's degree to earning an associate's degree or certificate."
• "The Perkins quality improvement strategies may be too vague to drive change."
• "Tech-Prep was a catalyst for certain vocational reform activities but . . . 12 years later, few schools implement Tech-Prep as a structured program."
• "Fewer than half of postsecondary vocational participants seeking a degree or certificate take enough courses to earn a credential."
• "Flexibility provisions [in the Perkins Act] are popular but may be weakening the targeting of funds to high-poverty communities."

The authors go on to offer several reform strategies, predictably consistent with Bush administration proposals, starting with sharpening and narrowing the Perkins Act's goals and strategies; separating the secondary and postsecondary programs; eliminating Tech-Prep as a discrete program; and streamlining accountability requirements. Depending, of course, on your level of interest in voc ed, this one may be worth your while-at least the short version. You can obtain additional information and download both long and short versions here.