The Education Gadfly Weekly

Like many states, Ohio has lately undertaken a slew of ambitious but much-needed K–12 education reforms. In the Buckeye State, these include ratcheting up academic-content standards (e.g., Ohio’s New Learning Standards, which includes the Common Core State Standards for math and English language arts), bringing new assessments online, putting in place new accountability measures, and expanding and ensuring quality school choices for parents and students. Taken together, these changes are significantly changing the ecosystem of Ohio’s public schools.

The spring session of the Ohio General Assembly generated few significant new reforms. But lawmakers pulled off a mostly commendable nip-and-tuck job on those already adopted. They fine-tuned several big reform initiatives in ways that should help schools put them into practice. They also improved accountability for Ohio’s school-choice programs. The Mid-Biennium Review bills (House Bills 483 and 487) now await the signature of Governor Kasich. Here we discuss the most substantive policy issues (save for teacher evaluations, which are discussed in the following piece).

Pausing Accountability

The General Assembly reasserted Ohio’s commitment to the Common Core and to the PARCC assessments. But it prudently slowed things down a bit. To help schools adjust to these new and more-challenging expectations, the legislature provided a one-year “safe harbor” for districts and schools. For the 2014–15 school year, the first year that PARCC will be fully operational, the legislature exempts schools and districts from accountability sanctions such as automatic charter closure, state receivership (via the Academic Distress Commission), and becoming a voucher-designated school under the “failing schools” EdChoice program (consequence for school buildings having a low school rating for two of the past three years).

Furthermore, Ohio’s lawmakers delayed the release of overall school and district A–F letter grades (they had been scheduled for 2014–15). The state board will determine whether schools’ grades on individual components of those report cards, like the value-added and performance indices, will be reported publicly for 2014–15. All in all, lawmakers hit the “pause” button on accountability for one year—and that’s reasonable policy. But let’s be sure to limit the moratorium to one year.

Clarifying Graduation Requirements

The state ramped up the high school graduation test-passage requirements, while also creating a clearer alternative pathway to graduation for students who struggle with the test provisions. The lawmakers officially—and thankfully—waved goodbye to the eight-year old Ohio Graduation Test (for all but current high school students). Instead, the state will require high school students to pass seven end-of-course (EOC) exams, starting with students who enter ninth grade this fall. In certain subjects, AP or IB test takers will be able to use those exam results instead of the state’s EOC exams. (Nobody wants students to be over tested.)

In addition to the EOC exams, the state has created two alternative pathways to graduation. First, students can graduate by earning a remediation-free score on the ACT or SAT (the state, going forward, will now administer one of them free of charge to all eleventh graders). The score necessary to meet the remediation-free standard will be determined by the Chancellor of the Board of Regents and will represent a level of attainment signifying that a student is ready to take college-level courses.

Alternatively, lawmakers created a pathway whereby students can graduate upon the passage of a job-skills assessment and earning an industry credential. The work-ready alternative is a sensible provision that gives non-college-bound students a clear path to high school graduation. It will be critical that the work-ready alternative is implemented in a manner that it isn’t just an attendance certificate but, instead, indicates that the student is prepared for a career.

The State Board will iron out the details of what constitutes “passing” the end-of-course exams, an AP exam, and a job-skills assessment in the coming months. All told, these changes clarify how the state’s next-generation high school assessments will align to graduation requirements, while also creating reasonable alternative pathways to graduation.

Strengthening Choice Programs

Lawmakers improved the state’s school-choice accountability (both charters and vouchers) in several ways. When it came to the charter-school law, the legislature made two key changes. First, it closed a loophole in law by crafting language that will ensure that schools shuttered under the state’s automatic closure law will remain closed. (State law now explicitly prohibits a closed school from reopening when it has any of the following: (a) the same authorizer, (b) the same school leader, (c) any of the same board members, (d) half or more of the same teaching staff, (e) half or more of the same administrative staff, or (f) the same performance contract.)

Lawmakers also added teeth to the charter law to ensure that startup schools don’t flame out—and that taxpayers aren’t left footing the bill. (The new provisions require ODE to withhold payments until the school’s authorizer confirms that the school has met basic administrative and fiscal requirements.) These are needed and welcome changes, but Ohio charter law still has a long way to go to ensure quality outcomes for Ohio’s charter students.

Meanwhile, when it comes to vouchers, changes are also afoot. State law will now require the retention of voucher students (either EdChoice or Cleveland) who do not pass their third-grade reading exam. Additionally, private schools that take voucher students will be required to adopt early-grade intervention efforts, such as parental notification if they have a child who is a struggling reader. These measures previously applied only to public schools under the third-grade reading guarantee, but now they also apply to private schools that enroll pupils with the help of state vouchers.

Addressing High School Dropouts

The state, as has been well reported in the media, has a massive dropout epidemic. In Governor Kasich’s February State of the State speech, he laid bare the dropout problem and proposed initiatives to stem the crisis. The General Assembly ratified a few of the governor’s dropout-prevention proposals, including career-advising requirements and the identification of students who are at risk of dropping out.

Lawmakers, however, cannot be commended for its handling of two dropout-prevention provisions. First, the legislature struck down the governor’s proposal to provide state aid to kick-start apprenticeships arranged between businesses and career- and technical-planning districts. That’s too bad, and it seems like a lost opportunity to forge stronger public-private partnerships. Second, lawmakers added a provision that allocates up to $5 million, so that adults age 22 and older can attend a dropout-recovery charter school to try to earn a high school diploma. These schools, many of which are authorized by traditional districts, have a shaky performance record. To us, this seemed like a brazen cash grab by K–12 schools that have poorly served high school students and don’t appear particularly well equipped to educate adults. Let’s hope Governor Kasich recognizes this provision for what it is and exercises his line-item veto authority.

Looking Ahead

For now, Governor Kasich and the General Assembly have deftly avoided the political rancor that has roiled other states. Most importantly, state leadership has preserved and reasserted Ohio’s commitment to the Common Core and to the state’s new assessments. But preserving these higher standards and assessments has not come without tradeoffs, as state lawmakers have sacrificed high-stakes accountability for one year. A short-term delay in accountability sanctions is a rational course, given just how feeble Ohio’s old and outgoing standards were. These new standards (and the impending drop in standardized-test scores) are sure to shock schools and the body politic. It does no good to leave things to chance.

Beyond the Common Core, much more is still to be settled. This includes a comprehensive overhaul of the state’s anemic charter-school law that goes beyond the tinkering (albeit in the right direction) that the legislature did during this session. New alternatives for academically at-risk students need to be explored, and “work-ready” pathways need to be better defined. In many respects, the state legislature has laid out a sensible course for Ohio’s schools and students. But the state’s education reforms remain fragile, and smart, assertive leaders will be essential to strengthen these initiatives in the days to come.

The Senate and House finally reached a compromise over changes to Ohio’s teacher-evaluation system (OTES), which, in its first year of statewide implementation, has drawn criticism from school leaders arising from what they say is its administrative burden. Some felt that, as a result of its classroom-observation mandates, principals may not have time to properly support any teacher, let alone those who struggle.

This journey began with a Senate bill passed back in December (Senate Bill 229), which continued with the House Education Committee proposing major changes—followed by weeks of debate on the competing versions. (A comparison of the two bills can be found here, and our analysis of the House bill is here.)

The compromise ended up in House Bill 362, which originally dealt with STEM-school matters. It now awaits Governor Kasich’s signature. Major changes include giving districts the option of changing the percentage of an evaluation tied to teacher performance and student growth from 50 percent to 42.5 percent each; providing districts with several different ways to make up the remaining 15 percent, including (but not limited to) student surveys; and allowing districts to be flexible with the observation frequency of top-rated teachers.

Everyone loves a happy ending. But as a former teacher, this bill leaves me with several lingering questions, as does OTES itself.

First, this has been the first year of OTES implementation for most Ohio districts. End-of-year test results won’t even be published until later this summer. So why were legislators in such a rush to change a policy that hasn’t yet run its course? Until results are released from all districts—not just preliminary findings from pilot districts—no one knows what the distribution of teacher ratings looks like under the original scheme. If the vast majority of them receive the highest or lowest possible rating, then lawmakers will need to alter the formula again. Unfortunately, the General Assembly didn’t wait to find out. Patience might have led to more suitable and durable changes.

Second, I have a hard time understanding why highly rated teachers should be evaluated less frequently than less-effective teachers. I had the opportunity to work alongside some phenomenal teachers in Memphis, Tennessee, and every single one of them would tell you that one of the most frustrating aspects of their job is a lack of consistent feedback on their performance. Teachers—all teachers—want to get better, and feedback from school leadership is essential. Teachers need content experts to help them think through curriculum planning and delivery, and they need colleagues who can spot questionable classroom practices that the instructor herself might not be aware of. So much emphasis is placed on the punitive aspect of teacher evaluations that it’s easy to ignore their potential to nudge teachers toward higher levels of performance— even the really good ones. While reduced observation seems to take the pressure off teachers (and principals), it actually limits teachers’ opportunities for professional growth.

Third, because OTES requires just two formal classroom observations annually, both announced beforehand, teacher evaluations are less reliable (and helpful) than they could be. How about those who aren’t at the top of their game? What about newbies? Tennessee has an observation component that treats experienced and inexperienced teachers differently. As a beginner, I was observed six times by multiple evaluators (the principal, assistant principal, content specialist, and instructional facilitator), who were all trained and certified by the Teacher Advancement Program. The variety in evaluators lowered the chances for bias and made it easier for my principal to juggle a large staff. My observations varied in length (anywhere from fifteen minutes to an entire lesson), were both announced and unannounced, and required post-conferences, during which I was able to sit down with my evaluator and discuss my ratings and my areas for growth.

If we really want evaluations to help teachers (especially new ones) grow, two observations will simply not do. Furthermore, OTES only requires those observations to last thirty minutes, which doesn’t always cover an entire lesson. How can evaluators rate the delivery of a lesson if they don’t even watch the whole thing? Finally, requiring only preannounced observations instead of a mix of announced and unannounced means that teachers can carefully plan and practice their lessons so they are near perfection when the evaluator walks in. But what about the rest of the curriculum and the school year? A solid observation looks at a teacher on an “average” day, not just when she prepares a “show.” Believe me, I put on plenty of shows when I was teaching. But the observations that I learned the most from were those I hadn’t known would occur.

If the Ohio General Assembly wants OTES truly to help teachers improve, lawmakers should have waited until the final results came out, asked teachers and administrators from all districts what worked and what didn’t, and then made the proper changes.

Ohio’s new school-building and district report cards got a big thumbs up from both parent reviewers and wonky researchers in a new study from the Education Commission of the States. In fact, Ohio was the recipient of the highest praise in the study which looked at accountability efforts in all fifty states. Reviews cited breadth of measures, ease of interpretation, and easy accessibility, among other things. And that position stands to improve with expanded data elements planned for roll out in 2015. Just one question remains: if this is so awesome, why did only the Dayton Daily News cover this prestigious result?

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The Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, in partnership with SRI International, has released a new report on blended learning that seems to indicate that, despite its many fans and rapid growth, kinks remain to get resolved if it’s to be transformative. Many software and online programs were found to be inadequate, glitchy, and poorly aligned to schools’ pace and sequence of instruction; insufficient bandwidth and hardware problems abounded; personalization of content to individual students was a problem for children on both the low and high ends of the ability spectrum; and multiple streams of data confounded teachers as to students’ understanding of material. The Ohio Gadfly fears that “user errors” of the types reported here could consign online teaching and learning to the category of something else to occupy students while the teachers grade papers. That would be a terrible waste of a promising opportunity.

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Another year and another record number of applications for Ohio’s voucher programs. A recent blog from School Choice Ohio (SCO) reports that more than 32,000 students applied for the 2014–15 school year. The EdChoice Scholarship was again the most popular, drawing 21,437 applications, more than 4,000 over the same time last year. The numbers are expected to rise again when the second application window opens later this summer. Gadfly tips his cap to SCO for its yeoman efforts to make families aware of their education options, but he also wonders how many more families would be interested if school districts didn’t work so hard to hide their options.

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Ohio Gadfly is pleased to announce its latest staff addition. Jessica Poiner, a former high school English teacher, joined the Fordham Institute’s Ohio Policy team in Columbus after finishing up with her kiddos in Memphis. She brings invaluable insight, erudition beyond her years, and strong creative energy to our work. Look out, world!

Are America’s urban schoolteachers working hard or hardly working? This new report from the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ) uncovers some troubling evidence that points toward the latter, at least for a non-trivial subset of teachers. The analysts examined teacher-attendance data from forty large districts in 2012–13, finding that teachers in these districts were absent, on average, eleven days out of the school year. (The analysis excluded long-term absences, such as those accrued due to maternity leave or serious illness.) In fairness, eleven days is slightly less than the average number of absences allowed under these districts’ personnel policies. The averages, however, mask considerable variation across and within school districts. Across this group of districts, two Ohio cities—Cleveland and Columbus—suffered the most severe teacher-absentee problems. Cleveland’s teachers were absent an average of sixteen days, while in Columbus, they averaged fifteen. Indianapolis (six days) and the District of Columbia (seven) had the lowest average number of days absent. Within districts, too, the analysts discovered both “chronically absent” teachers (eighteen or more days absent) and those with near-perfect attendance. In Cleveland, for example, 6 percent of the teachers had “excellent” attendance—bless their hearts—while a staggering 34 percent were “chronically” absent. We can’t be sure why some districts have more acute problems with teacher absenteeism than others. But it is evident that urban districts need to do a better job of ensuring their teachers come to work. The academic stakes are high: those kids need all hands on deck.

Nithya Joseph, Nancy Waymack, and Daniel Zielaski, Roll Call: The Importance of Teacher Attendance (Washington, D.C.: National Council on Teacher Quality, June 2014).

Private-school choice programs are one valuable way of delivering high-quality education to low-income kids. Some choice proponents, however, fear that government will saddle participating schools with stifling regulations, making them leery of accepting voucher students at all. So how burdensome are the regulations in place today? The Friedman Foundation dives into the issue in a new report, which measures the regulatory impact of state statutes on twenty-three choice programs across twelve states. Aside from a few outliers, researcher Andrew Catt finds that strong government regulations on private schools were already in place prior to the introduction of these choice programs—and that adopting choice programs did not add much to the regulatory burden. Regulations that were implemented after choice programs were enacted dealt mostly with paperwork or reporting. (Regulations on bigger issues, such as testing and curriculum, were generally already in place.) In other words, in most states at least, school-choice programs haven’t led to a crushing regulatory burden on private schools. And thanks to the innovative methodology developed by Catt for this paper, we have a sophisticated way to track whether that remains the case over time.

Andrew D. Catt, Public Rules on Private Schools: Measuring the Regulatory Impact of State Statutes and School Choice Programs (Washington, D.C.: Friedman Foundation, May 2014).