The Education Gadfly Weekly

Thomas Dee and Brian Jacob
NBER Working Paper
November 2009

Researchers have produced a slew of studies in the last several years that purport to address No Child Left Behind’s impact (or lack thereof) on student achievement. This latest from well-regarded economists Thomas Dee and Brian Jacob uses state-level (and low-stakes) NAEP data from 1992-93 to 2006-07 to trace the influence of the landmark legislation. They analyze changes in NAEP scores for two groups: states that already had school-accountability policies in place prior to the year when NCLB was fully implemented (the control group) and those that did not (the treatment group). The idea is that NCLB would represent less of a “treatment” in states that already had NCLB-like accountability policies in place; hence, they can serve as foils to states that lacked such practices prior to NCLB’s full implementation in 2002-03. They conclude that NCLB produced statistically significant increases in the average math performance of 4th graders, and in the highest and lowest achievement percentiles. They also witnessed improvements in 8th grade math, especially among low-achievers. But there was no evidence of a similar effect on reading achievement in either grade. Since more than half the states had introduced school accountability policies within the four years prior to NCLB’s implementation, they also conducted a separate analysis that omitted these “late adopters” (since newly-birthed state policies and NCLB policies could easily intermingle and understate the latter’s effect). As expected, the gains attributed to NCLB rose. Of course the integrity of the study rests on whether the pre- and post-NCLB groups make a valid comparison. Dee and Jacob use a prior framework (developed by Eric Hanushek and Margaret Raymond) to identify states that had NCLB-esque systems pre-NCLB. But they also added some states and re-coded a handful of others based on new information and data that they assembled. Though they appear to approach the coding of states carefully, there’s an element of subjectivity to virtually any coding effort, which means the impact of NCLB on achievement might be more or less robust than Dee and Jacob contend. You can purchase their study for a small fee here.

Michael & Susan Dell Foundation
November 2009

This report urges the adoption of sensible Performance Management Systems in schools, which is not altogether surprising, that being an area in which the Dell Foundation has invested considerable money. Whereas previous research on “portfolio districts” (see here and here) focused on how management systems can be useful at the district level, this report is more concerned with how they can be useful to individual teachers and pupils. In case you were wondering, Performance Management Systems are software programs that contain key data like grades, standardized test scores, and class-by-class attendance records for each student. Such information can help teachers gain greater understanding of their students, but at most schools it’s tucked away in administrative files with limited access. But Performance Management Systems are more than databases and do more than make information more accessible. The best of them can monitor trends, analyze progress toward goals, make statistics-based projections regarding the future, and present key findings in a user-friendly interface. Thus, teachers can easily see, for example, that a particular student is missing so many classes that it puts him at a high risk of dropping out, or that his math grades have fallen since he switched to the honors class. The idea is to use real-time data to spot latent problems--and intervene before they become serious ones. The report offers brief case studies of such systems at work in Austin, New York, and Chicago. Still, though data-driven decision-making has much potential to improve learning, schools and districts ought not to concentrate exclusively on problem areas, and thereby ignore high-achievers who pass all the system’s metrics and fly under the radar. The report is available for download here.

Bryan C. Hassel and Daniela Doyle, Public Impact
Connecticut Coalition for Achievement Now (ConnCAN)
November 2009

Connecticut’s current school funding system is inequitable, inefficient, and ineffective. So says the Connecticut Coalition for Achievement Now (ConnCAN). The Nutmeg state’s murky and misguided budget channels fail to produce student gains. Though its per-pupil spending levels rank among the highest in the land, it is home to one of the widest socioeconomic achievement gaps. In this report, ConnCAN explains specific problems with Connecticut’s education funding structure, analyzes why these issues are so troublesome, and then proposes a three-part solution: portable and variable student-based funding; an accessible and intelligible database to increase fiscal transparency; and dramatically increased budgetary flexibility for districts and schools. Tying dollars to students, and varying the amounts to align with student needs, as Fordham has previously noted, would yield multiple benefits, such as incentivizing schools to keep students, particularly those who are more challenging to educate. ConnCAN asserts, we think plausibly, that these three steps will enable the state to respond to demographic shifts, educate disadvantaged students, incentivize great school operators to serve high-needs locales, and allocate funds more fairly. You can find the report here.

On November 24, Arizona's H.B. 2011, originally passed in September, went into effect. That means that districts are now barred from using tenure and seniority when making hiring and firing decisions, and granted new flexibility when it comes to notifying current teachers whether they'll be retained and on what criteria they'll make salary decisions (specifically, that they need not be based on seniority). Though in large part this bill was less about contracts and more about local control, we can't help but note the irony that districts had their union-contract shackles replaced by another set of restraints: districts who do want to make hiring and firing decisions based on seniority are no longer allowed to do so. That enables the Arizona chapter of the NEA to assert that these changes have now made the Grand Canyon State one of the 'most restrictive' on teacher hiring, firing, and salaries. That's probably true, if you're talking about restricting the unions; as for districts and schools that will be finally be able to make hiring, firing, and salary decisions based on something other than seniority, however, we think of this as freedom.

Law changes way teachers contract with districts, by Alex Bloom,??The Arizona Republic, November 23, 2009

We have schools that teach Ebonics, schools that don’t assign grades or tests, schools that promote Afro-centric or Mexican curricula, and schools run by students. Add to this whacky list schools in the Big Apple run by none other than ACORN. Yes, infamous ACORN of voter-fraud- and prostitution-fame. Though the two NYC schools bearing the organization’s name claim that they’re no longer affiliated, parents and teachers say they do indeed follow ACORN’s philosophy of “reform and change.” And even if ACORN itself has been evicted from the city’s schools, it left many “social justice” relatives in its wake. Take the Bushwick Community High School in Brooklyn whose mission “is for students to become empowered for positive social transformation and liberation.” Then there’s the Vanguard High School in Manhattan that recently hosted a “radical math” conference--not to be confused, mind you, with “Social Justice Math.” That no-doubt enthralling confab included a session on “how to use the history of the Black Panther Party to fuel an algebraic curriculum.” Next, we find students at Banana Kelly High School in the Bronx who practice “restorative justice”--misbehaving students are asked to “acknowledge their feelings” as opposed to, perhaps, sitting in detention doing schoolwork. Geez, enough is enough. Clearly the let-a-thousand-flowers-bloom approach is not working in American schools--and the social-justice bloom has turned into a real stinker in New York. It’s not clear how many ACORN-inspired schools there are in other cities, but since the organization has offices in most every major metropolis, we’d bet there are quite a few. We’re all for choice and charters, which most of these schools are. But we’re also for rigorous, honest curricula and schools that impart solid American values, not revolutionary zeal.

“Crackpot schools,” by Jacob Gershman, New York Post, December 1, 2009

When the Washington D.C. Archdiocese agreed to convert seven of its schools to charters in 2007, the education world was taken aback. But the transition went smoothly and, by all accounts, the schools are thriving. So why now, when faced with a possible closing of fourteen more Catholic schools (seven in Maryland and seven in the District), is the Archdiocese apparently considering every possible solution except that one? Instead, it seems, the Archdiocese is mobilizing parents to lobby for the resuscitation of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program, which was more-or-less halted by Congress a few months back (though current enrollees will be allowed to finish). At least one in five youngsters in the seven financially-problematic D.C. Catholic schools is a voucher-recipient; at one of the seven, voucher recipients are one in two. But what about Maryland’s seven, clustered mostly in working class areas with significant Hispanic and black populations, like Silver Spring, Hyattsville, and Greenbelt, where there is no voucher program? There is another way. Research on Catholic-charter conversions, courtesy of yours truly and Seton Partners, as well as the Archdiocese’s own experiences two years ago, means it might even be smoother going this time around. There’s definitely something lost when a Catholic school goes secular, but that’s a far cry better than closing them down all together.

"Catholic schools look at closing," by Michael Birnbaum, Washington Post, November 24, 2009

Try this education Rorschach. Imagine a public school that’s knocking the roof off of the state test. Its classes are led by energetic, passionate, thoughtful teachers who engage their students in rigorous study. The curriculum is rich and varied, with plenty of time for history and science, art and music, along with the 3 Rs. Its classrooms are orderly, its students respectful to one another and to adults. But it’s not dour; there’s a sense of joy, even wonder, at the school. It’s a lively, bright, warm place to be.

Now add this one wrinkle: all of its students are poor and black (or Hispanic). It is as “segregated” as Southern schools before Brown. Here’s the test: Do you think this school is unabashedly worth celebrating? Replicating? Viewing as a national model?

There’s no right or wrong answer, but the thought experiment illumines a divide within the education world. If you said “yes, this is a wonderful achievement that we’ve created these sorts of schools,” then count yourself within the (now-mainstream) education-reform community. You look at the typical KIPP school or Amistad Academy or any of the other “high flying” high-poverty, all-minority schools and say “see: it can be done.” You embrace the “no excuses” battle cry. Even schools full of poor and black/brown kids can achieve tremendous results--and we should have more of them.

If, on the other hand, you find this picture regrettable, somewhat sad, maybe even unsettling, your inclinations are more aligned with the traditional civil rights view. Sure, you acknowledge that great “black” schools are better than terrible ones, yet you don’t count this as a success, not really. After all, academic learning is just one part of schools’ missions; helping to create the next generation of citizens is another. And in our diverse, multicultural world, kids need to learn how to work and play with all kinds of people, not just those who look like them.

Moreover, poor minority kids in particular need to learn how to navigate the mores of middle class America. Yes, “paternalistic” schools like KIPP try to prepare their students for that but wouldn’t it be easier if they actually went to school with middle class kids in the first place? And with plenty of recent evidence (including from “conservative” scholars like Eric Hanushek and Caroline Hoxby) showing that “peer effects” really do matter--black students in particular do better when more of their classmates are white--aren’t we tying one hand behind our back when we try to make “separate but equal” work?

This precise debate is one that the Left is currently engaged in. As Richard Kahlenberg of the Century Foundation reported a few weeks ago, a group of civil rights groups recently hosted a conference and invited Administration officials to attend--and to explain why President Obama and Secretary Duncan have focused on fixing high-poverty schools (and creating great high-poverty charter schools)--rather than making these schools more integrated in the first place. (The civil rights groups want more attention and funds for initiatives like magnet schools and “controlled choice” programs.) Kahlenberg told me that participants agreed that it need not be “either/or”: that we should try to create more high-quality high-poverty schools--while also taking forceful action to integrate schools.

Here’s a related suggestion: What about creating a lot more racially- and economically-integrated charter schools? To some, that might sound like an oxymoron: When we think of great charter schools, we tend to picture the KIPPs and Amistads and such, which tend to be all-minority and mostly poor. And public policy has created incentives for schools to focus on this demographic; many states only allow charters to serve “disadvantaged” youngsters or locate in “failing” districts. But philanthropy is guilty, too; several foundations have shunned integrated charter schools because they don’t serve “enough” poor kids or, taken as a whole, their pupil population isn’t “needy” enough.

Yet even in the face of these challenges, at least a handful of fantastic, integrated charter schools have gotten off the ground. Consider Capital City Charter School in Washington--the first public school the Obamas visited as President and First Lady--which serves equal numbers of white, black, and Hispanic children and roughly equal proportions of poor and middle class kids--and which has gotten strong results over its ten-year history. There’s the famous High Tech High (HTH), founded with an explicit mission to serve a diverse group of students in the San Diego area. And there’s the Denver School of Science and Technology (DSST)--the best school in Denver, which is just about perfectly integrated along racial and class lines. Such schools should offer inspiration to the school reform, pro-charter crowd, as well as civil rights types--indeed, to just about everyone except neo-separatists who would prefer that, say, African-American youngsters learn from African-American teachers in Afro-centric schools.

But schools like these need help. Both HTH and DSST must forego federal charter start-up funds because they refuse to use a standard lottery. (Federal law mandates that charter schools not use admissions requirements--if a school is oversubscribed, it must use a random lottery to decide who gets in.) It’s not that they want to keep low-income kids out; rather, they want to make sure that enough low-income children can get in. Because these schools are so popular, including among savvy, middle class parents, the applicant pool naturally skews toward better-educated, wealthier families. To counteract this, High Tech High, for example, employs a zip-code based lottery, enabling it to override San Diego’s stark residential segregation. (Each zip code gets so many slots.) And DSST holds two lotteries--one for low-income students, and one for everyone else--allowing it to be sure that at least 40 percent of its students are poor. A change in federal law would allow more charter schools to adopt these strategies--without giving up their start-up funds for replication efforts.

What KIPP and other high-poverty, high performing charter schools have achieved is remarkable and praiseworthy and, in the foreseeable future--because most urban areas have so few white and middle class families with school-age children--making high-poverty schools work has to be a big part of the education-reform agenda. But school segregation is just as harmful today as in 1950--and integrated charter schools could be one way toward a brighter future.

The “helicopter parent” may be coming back to earth, or so this longish TIME piece hypothesizes. As readers may know, helicopter parents hover over their children pretty much 24/7. Such a parent might hire tutors to correct a 5-year-old’s “pencil-holding deficiency,” throw out the swing set so Johnny doesn’t hurt himself, demand that nursery schools teach Mandarin to give little Sarah a leg up, or, in the worst case scenario, ghostwrite the kids’ homework assignments. But as with so many things in education that get carried too far, the pendulum may be swinging back. We now learn of “free-range” parenting, obviously meant to make us think of chickens allowed to peck for worms and bugs rather than being confined in airless coops. Yes, kids need some freedom to be kids and yes, too many parents have been way too “involved.” But children also need structure, discipline and protection. Extremes in child-rearing are never a good thing. 

“The Growing Backlash Against Overparenting,” by Nancy Gibbs, TIME Magazine, November 20, 2009

Gadfly’s high hopes and expectations for New York State Education Commissioner David Steiner were sustained by his first major policy move. In a presentation to the Regents, Steiner made an impassioned case for reform of teacher preparation. His plan has five parts: a rigorous new certification test that factors in student performance; an overhaul of education school curricula; new accountability measures for ed schools, including tracking graduates’ effects on their students’ achievement; alternative paths to certification for new teachers; and bonuses for teachers teaching in high-needs schools and subjects. Most attention has centered on the possibility that New York might (finally) open up some alternative pathways into public-school teaching. This would, inter alia, make life a lot simpler for programs like Teach for America and The New Teacher Project, whose Empire State participants are currently forced to take traditional ed-school courses at night--and it would let providers other than those same ed schools offer preparation programs. Also important, however, are Steiner’s plans to reform the certification test and ed schools themselves, both of which were recently advocated by Education Secretary Arne Duncan (in a New York speech), and which could go a long way toward improving teacher quality. The details still need to be worked out—and that’s always risky, including pushback from Steiner’s own stodgy bureaucracy, but the Regents have the power to enact most of them without legislative intervention. Let’s hope they do.

“Finally getting real on training teachers,” by Thomas W. Carroll, New York Post, November 18, 2009

“Programs to Certify Teachers May Grow,” by Jennifer Medina, New York Times, November 15, 2009

Thomas Dee and Brian Jacob
NBER Working Paper
November 2009

Researchers have produced a slew of studies in the last several years that purport to address No Child Left Behind’s impact (or lack thereof) on student achievement. This latest from well-regarded economists Thomas Dee and Brian Jacob uses state-level (and low-stakes) NAEP data from 1992-93 to 2006-07 to trace the influence of the landmark legislation. They analyze changes in NAEP scores for two groups: states that already had school-accountability policies in place prior to the year when NCLB was fully implemented (the control group) and those that did not (the treatment group). The idea is that NCLB would represent less of a “treatment” in states that already had NCLB-like accountability policies in place; hence, they can serve as foils to states that lacked such practices prior to NCLB’s full implementation in 2002-03. They conclude that NCLB produced statistically significant increases in the average math performance of 4th graders, and in the highest and lowest achievement percentiles. They also witnessed improvements in 8th grade math, especially among low-achievers. But there was no evidence of a similar effect on reading achievement in either grade. Since more than half the states had introduced school accountability policies within the four years prior to NCLB’s implementation, they also conducted a separate analysis that omitted these “late adopters” (since newly-birthed state policies and NCLB policies could easily intermingle and understate the latter’s effect). As expected, the gains attributed to NCLB rose. Of course the integrity of the study rests on whether the pre- and post-NCLB groups make a valid comparison. Dee and Jacob use a prior framework (developed by Eric Hanushek and Margaret Raymond) to identify states that had NCLB-esque systems pre-NCLB. But they also added some states and re-coded a handful of others based on new information and data that they assembled. Though they appear to approach the coding of states carefully, there’s an element of subjectivity to virtually any coding effort, which means the impact of NCLB on achievement might be more or less robust than Dee and Jacob contend. You can purchase their study for a small fee here.

Michael & Susan Dell Foundation
November 2009

This report urges the adoption of sensible Performance Management Systems in schools, which is not altogether surprising, that being an area in which the Dell Foundation has invested considerable money. Whereas previous research on “portfolio districts” (see here and here) focused on how management systems can be useful at the district level, this report is more concerned with how they can be useful to individual teachers and pupils. In case you were wondering, Performance Management Systems are software programs that contain key data like grades, standardized test scores, and class-by-class attendance records for each student. Such information can help teachers gain greater understanding of their students, but at most schools it’s tucked away in administrative files with limited access. But Performance Management Systems are more than databases and do more than make information more accessible. The best of them can monitor trends, analyze progress toward goals, make statistics-based projections regarding the future, and present key findings in a user-friendly interface. Thus, teachers can easily see, for example, that a particular student is missing so many classes that it puts him at a high risk of dropping out, or that his math grades have fallen since he switched to the honors class. The idea is to use real-time data to spot latent problems--and intervene before they become serious ones. The report offers brief case studies of such systems at work in Austin, New York, and Chicago. Still, though data-driven decision-making has much potential to improve learning, schools and districts ought not to concentrate exclusively on problem areas, and thereby ignore high-achievers who pass all the system’s metrics and fly under the radar. The report is available for download here.

Bryan C. Hassel and Daniela Doyle, Public Impact
Connecticut Coalition for Achievement Now (ConnCAN)
November 2009

Connecticut’s current school funding system is inequitable, inefficient, and ineffective. So says the Connecticut Coalition for Achievement Now (ConnCAN). The Nutmeg state’s murky and misguided budget channels fail to produce student gains. Though its per-pupil spending levels rank among the highest in the land, it is home to one of the widest socioeconomic achievement gaps. In this report, ConnCAN explains specific problems with Connecticut’s education funding structure, analyzes why these issues are so troublesome, and then proposes a three-part solution: portable and variable student-based funding; an accessible and intelligible database to increase fiscal transparency; and dramatically increased budgetary flexibility for districts and schools. Tying dollars to students, and varying the amounts to align with student needs, as Fordham has previously noted, would yield multiple benefits, such as incentivizing schools to keep students, particularly those who are more challenging to educate. ConnCAN asserts, we think plausibly, that these three steps will enable the state to respond to demographic shifts, educate disadvantaged students, incentivize great school operators to serve high-needs locales, and allocate funds more fairly. You can find the report here.