Federal Update - July 3, 2008
Brought
to you by your voice at the national level,
the Association of American
Educators.
Americans’ Views on the Nation’s Education System Revealed
Providing Resources Early for Kids Act
Achievement Gaps Closing in U.S. Schools
U.S. Supreme Court Rules on Union Neutrality
Study Analyzes Schools of Education
Six States Approved For the Differentiated Accountability Pilot Program
Americans’ Views on the Nation’s Education System Revealed
In a recent poll conducted by the Associated Press, 854 parents and 833 members of the general population were surveyed about their views of public schools in the United States. Respondents to the survey expressed their views about the state of public schools in the United States and specific issues that affect them, such as teacher pay and the amount of time students spend in school.
A little over half of the respondents surveyed believe that public schools are doing a good or excellent job preparing students for college. Sixty-one percent of parents surveyed believe public schools are preparing their children for college while 54 percent of the general population believes students are prepared. On the question of whether students are prepared for the workforce, the numbers declined slightly with only 44 percent of the general population surveyed believing students are prepared and 57 percent of parents trusting that public schools have adequately prepared students.
When asked about what subjects schools should spend more time studying, over a third of respondents believe it should be math while 21 percent of respondents believe it should be English. Eighty-nine percent of the general population surveyed and 87 percent of parents surveyed also believe that the issue of students not spending enough time in school is a serious issue.
On the issue of pay for teachers and teacher strikes, 61 percent of respondents in the general population category and 58 percent of parents surveyed believe that teachers pay should be based at least in some part on student achievement. Fifty-three percent of respondents in the parent and general population categories believe teachers should be able to strike.
The survey was conducted by Knowledge Networks and funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
To read the survey in its entirety, please go to http://surveys.ap.org/data/KnowledgeNetworks/AP%20Education%20Poll%20Topline%2006-24-08.pdf.
Also, please read the article titled, “Poll: Schools Not Properly Preparing Kids,” at http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5ii0M-GfTcRlHSY98XhSa7-0pEtMwD91IKBF80..
Providing Resources Early for Kids Act
On June 26 the House Education and Labor Committee passed the Providing Resources Early for Kids Act (HR 3289). The bill directs the Secretary of Education to award states competitive grants to expand state funded preschool programs. Recipients of the grants will be able to use them to increase the number of early childhood educators with bachelor degrees, increase the benefits given to teachers, teacher aides, and program directors, decrease class sizes, implement research-based curricula and expand services such as health screenings and nutritional assistance.
“Children’s brains develop more quickly during their pre-kindergarten years than at any other time. This bill will provide quality early learning experiences for children around the country, and help them, their families, and our country prosper,” stated U.S. Rep. Dale E. Kildee (D-MI), chairman of the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary and Secondary Education.
Republicans on the House Education and Labor Committee have criticized the bill for adding a new layer of bureaucracy instead of using the resources for Head Start.
“Layering on a redundant new bureaucracy while refusing to target all available resources to the children we’ve already committed to serve is a glaring case of misplaced priorities,” said Rep. Howard P. “Buck” McKeon (R-CA), the committee’s senior Republican. “The bill’s authors may have good intentions, but the consequences of this bill will be to drain resources from the very children who need them most.”
For more information about the bill, please go to the majority office of the House Education and Labor Committee at http://www.house.gov/apps/list/speech/edlabor_dem/rel062608.html or the minority office at http://republicans.edlabor.house.gov/PRArticle.aspx?NewsID=638.
Achievement Gaps Closing in U.S. Schools
According to a new report by the Center on Education Policy (CEP), students in the U.S. are improving in reading and math and the achievement gaps between various groups of students is closing. The researchers of the study analyzed state test data from all 50 states during 2002 to 2007 as well as data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). When looking at states with sufficient data, the study found that 21 states made moderate-to-large gains in math at the elementary level, 22 states showed gains at the middle level and 12 states showed gains in math at the high school level. In reading 17 states showed gains at the elementary level, 14 states made gains at the middle level, and eight states showed gains in high school.
Achievement gaps, especially for African-American and low-income children, were narrowed more than they were widened between 2002 and 2007. In 327 instances the achievement gaps narrowed when analyzing proficiency levels, subjects, and grade levels. In only 76 instances did they increase and in 20 instances they stayed the same.
While achievement gaps narrowed in many instances, there is still room for improvements. In Mississippi, for example, between 2003 and 2007 the achievement gap in high school reading was reduced by eight percentage points but there is still a 24-point gap between whites and blacks with 43 percent of white students proficient in high school reading and only 19 percent of blacks.
“Through NCLB and many state and local efforts, the nation has sought to raise test scores and to narrow the achievement gap. These results show that we are making progress, although much more work needs to be done,” stated Jack Jennings, president and chief executive officer of CEP.
For further information about the report, please go to http://www.cep-dc.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=document_ext.showDocumentByID&nodeID=1&DocumentID=241.
U.S. Supreme Court Rules on Union Neutrality
With a 7-2 decision the U.S. Supreme Court has recently struck down a California law that placed restrictions on what employers were allowed to say when union organizing campaigns were occurring in the workplace. The California law had prohibited private employers that received more than $10,000 in state funds from using those funds to “assist, promote or deter union organizing.”
In the case Chamber of Commerce v. Brown, the Supreme Court decided that the law infringed upon employers First Amendment Rights by not allowing them to speak out against union organizing. The Court also noted that the National Labor Relations Act “expressly precludes regulation of speech about unionization” as long as employees are not threatened or promised anything.
For more information about the case, please go to http://www.prweb.com/releases/2008/7/prweb1062354.htm.
Study Analyzes Schools of Education
According to the National Council on Teacher Quality (NCTQ), many schools of education are not adequately preparing students to teach math effectively in elementary schools. The authors of the report, “No Common Denominator: The Preparation of Elementary Teachers in Mathematics by America’s Education Schools,” looked at the teaching methods of 77 education schools in 49 states and found that only 13 percent of education schools provide sufficient amounts of math coursework for graduates of the schools to effectively teach math in elementary school classrooms.
The report also found that many schools do not test the math skills of applicants before admitting them. One out of six schools in the study admitted students without determining whether they can do grade school arithmetic. The study also found that often times schools set low standards for their students in math. The report found that the math content on exit tests used to award teaching licenses are often times very similar to the admission tests. As a result, students are not required to acquire many additional math skills during their time in schools of education.
“As a nation, our dislike and discomfort with math is so endemic that we do not even find it troubling when elementary teachers admit to their own weaknesses in basic mathematics. Not only are our education schools not tackling these weaknesses, they accommodate them with low expectations and insufficient content,” stated Kate Walsh, president of NCTQ.
To help ensure that students in schools of education receive a more rigorous curriculum NCTQ has proposed that schools only admit students who demonstrate knowledge of high-school level math and new state licensing tests.
For more information about the report, please go to http://www.nctq.org/p/publications/docs/nctq_ttmath_exec_summ.pdf.
Six States Approved For the Differentiated Accountability Pilot Program
On July 1, U.S. Department of Education Secretary Margaret Spellings announced that Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland and Ohio have been approved to participate in the Differentiated Accountability Pilot Program. The pilot program will allow the approved states to put into practice a system that makes distinctions between schools that have barely missed their goals and schools that need greater interventions. Before this program, there were no distinctions made between these schools.
The six states were chosen from a group of seventeen states that had submitted proposals for the Differentiated Accountability Pilot Program. The other states that submitted proposals included: Alaska, Arkansas, Louisiana, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. All of the proposals were reviewed by a peer review panel made up of nationally recognized experts in accountability from the fields of academia, the private sector and state and local organizations.
The six states that have been approved to participate in the program will be required to share data and participate in an evaluation program for the Department.
In fall 2008 additional states will be invited by the Department to submit Differentiated Accountability proposals.
For more information about the Differentiated Accountability program, please go to http://www.ed.gov/news/pressreleases/2008/07/07012008.html.