Dropout Nation

For years, the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers have complained that teachers are paid too little and deserve more money. But now, taxpayers in California, Indiana, Texas and other states are learning that teachers are actually are the best-compensated in the public sector — the hard way — thanks to unfunded teacher retirement and healthcare liabilities. Read more about it in my piece for The American Spectator.

More Arne Duncan hoopla: Alexander Russo hits up his friends at Catalyst Chicago for more data on the

A key to stemming dropouts can be found in a series of bound volumes. Read to your children -- and to the kids that aren

Secretary of Education-Designate and finds him lacking. As always. Joanne Jacobs hopes Duncan will actually live up to expectations from the school reform movement.

Darling-Hammond: Still lurking: Mike Petrilli speculates that the Obama adviser may land inside the Department of Education anyway — this time overseeing the National Center for Education Statistics and all important What Works Clearinghouse as head of the Institute of Education Sciences. This is all just guessing. But if true, then putting the wolf in charge of the henhouse may have never been so wrongheaded. After all, Darling-Hammond is no Joe Kennedy and IES is not the SEC.

And more Petrilli: This time, teaming up with the Grand Pubah of the conservative end of the school reform movement to propose another federal path for education reform. One part of this ‘fourth way’ — using federal dollars to encourage states to pursue systemic overhauls and experiments — seems similar in a way to Andy Rotherham’s proposal last month to encourage innovative reforms. On the other side, the proposals to eliminate No Child’s school transfer, teacher quality, school sanctions and testing rules means that Petrilli and Finn are all but calling for a gutting of the law. More analysis later, but one can expect the EdTrust/EdSector/rest of us wing to first think: “With school reform allies like these…”

Dropping out early and often: A third of dropouts leaving the Rowan-Salisbury school district are freshmen, reports the Salisbury Post. Of course, these aren’t 15-year-olds, but 16-year-olds who never earned enough credits to move on to sophomore year. At the same time, the North Carolina school district seems to have another problem: So-called “career and college tech” tracks that allow students to evade a strong, useful college prep education that, by the way, can be used by those who want to go into welding or other skilled trades. The students don’t take Algebra II, even though the course teaches math skills used in manufacturing. High dropouts. Unchallenging curricula. What a formula for success.

Eduwonkette should lighten up: So writes EdSector’s Erin Dillon in response to the blogger’s tirade over the Washington Post’’s fine series on the performance and governance of the Beltway’s charter schools. Dillon is particularly amazed that Eduwonkette — no pal of school choice or education reform — would use the American Federation of Teachers’ notoriously rubbish 2004 report on charter schools, which attempted to make conclusions that no one could actually reach based on the actual data itelf. Attempting to use broad national data to criticize a news organization’s report on one local school district is, umm, destined to be embarrassing for the person who does so.

And yes, Dropout Nation is back. Check out the sister Web site for some of the work that has kept your occasionally haggard editor away for a while.

Caring, highly-qualified teachers are important in keeping children in school. So the nation must improve the way it recruits, trains and retains instructors. The status quo just won't do. (Illustration courtesy of PBS.)

What’s inside — and outside — the dropout nation (updates and new articles marked with an *):

• It’s about the teachers: Jay Mathews hits on this point in this latest Washington Post column. Although parents and even administrators spend much time on the less-than-ideal conditions of the buildings in which children learn, Mathews notes that the highest-quality learning occurs in buildings in which boilers are broken down and dilapidated churches…
• And keeping the at-risk students in school: Mathews also rehashes an earlier debate he had with a California vocational school teacher, who argues that not every child wants to go to college and therefore, should be given a strong shop-and-technical school education. My view: The emphasis on college isn’t a bad thing at all, especially in light of the reality that college coursework is becoming an increasingly important qualification in getting blue-collar jobs; the same math skills (algebra and trigonometry) still apply in both cases. Besides, why shouldn’t a plumber also know about Chaucer? The real issue isn’t a need for vocational education — which public schools do an even worse job of providing — but engaging the minds and souls of children in the first place.
• Bad teacher policymaking, Volume M: California’s legislature is looking to shut down a loophole that allows teachers who plead ‘no contest’ to sex offense charges to continue teaching until their case is heard before the state teacher certification commission. As Joanne Jacobs and Darren Miller of Right on the Left Coast notes, the California Teachers Association — well-known for throwing its heft around in that statehouse — opposes closing the loophole. And given the union’s influence on the legislature, the bill may well fail to pass.
• A time for innovation in education: Newark Mayor Cory Booker hooks up with venture capitalist John Doerr (a longtime sponsor of school choice efforts) and California Board of Education President Ted Mitchell to argue for a school innovation venture fund in the Los Angeles Times. The goal: Pour more money into vouchers and other innovations to improve the performance of the nation’s public education system.
• The value of school choice: David W. Kirkpatrick uses his weekly EducationNews.org column as a Q-and-A on the value of vouchers, public charter schools and other choice plans. Reader Bill O’Dea responds with a Q-and-A of his own.
• Keeping mayoral control of schools: Michael Bloomberg’s fairly successful effort to reform what was one of the nation’s most dysfunctional school systems has been highly lauded nationally. As the New York Times points out today, this doesn’t mean that the powers that be in Albany will extend mayoral control beyond 2009. Bloomberg has long had support from the state Senate Republicans who run the upper house, but Sheldon Silver (who helped orchestrate the end of tenure reform earlier this year) and his Assembly Democrats are notorious for cowtowing to the New York State United Teachers and the United Federation of Teachers, United’s largest affiliate and the key union in New York City schools. As usual, all of this will not come down to the best interest of the city’s children.

Yours truly is finishing up some projects this week and will be on vacation from August 29 to September 2. So Dropout Nation will be updated intermittently. A Daily Read will be up later this evening and tomorrow morning. All the best to you.

By homeschooling his children, Paul Cotton is taking control of the educational -- and ultimately, social and economic -- destinies of his children, making their lives better. Not every parent can -- or even should -- homeschool. But every parent, including black parents, can be more pushy and active in charting the educational course of the lives of their children. Do it. (Photo courtesy of the Houston Chronicle.)

Commentary and thinking inside all around the dropout nation (updates and new stories marked with an *):

• Homeschooling: Not just for Fundamentalist Christians anymore: Although the number of black families engaged in homeschooling is still a smidgen of the overall population — a mere 220,000, according to the National Home Education Research Institute (and more likely, a little less than that, if one looks at the 1999 National Center for Educational Statistics data), it has become a choice for middle-class families not too cool with how public schools treat racial minorities, according to the Houston Chronicle. If so, this marks another sea-change in how groups that have been traditionally allied with traditional public education are viewing the status quo.
• Parental engagement? We need more of it!: And they need to be pushy about it to boot, declares Lord Adonis, Britain’s education minister. If the nation is going to get rid of the most substandard of its public schools, it will be up to parents to eschew those places and head toward with better academic performance. For months, the rival of –and likely successor to — Prime Minister Gordon Brown, Conservative Party leader David Cameron, has been arguing that line. Now, imagine U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings saying the same thing. Can’t. Proves my point: It will take more federal and state school officials embracing more active parental involvement before parents will dare get themselves entangled in battles with teachers and administrators over the direction of the schools to which parents send their kids.
• Speaking of substandard: The Spring Branch Independent School District in Houston may join Dallas Independent schools in watering down standards; this time, the school board appointed a committee looking into limiting the amount of homework given to students, reports the Houston Chronicle. Why? The poor children are being stressed out. Actually, it’s the suburban parents of the district who are stressed out by actually having to be parents. Again, like the battle against standardized testing, which has suburbanites allied with teachers’ unions and suburban school districts against urban districts and school reformers on both the left and right, this is another lifestyle argument that has little to do with actually dealing with the reality that suburban school districts are often doing no better in elevating the academic performance of the children in their care than urban counterparts.
• Attempting to keep them in school: Fifty percent of students in Muskegon High School in Michigan drop out, thus making the school a major dropout factory outside of Detroit. So the school district is looking at ways to stem the tide, according to the Muskegon Chronicle. One move: Hire specialists such as Chandar Ricks to focus on getting kids back in school and keeping the at-risk students inside. This is an approach that has been taken by districts such as Indianapolis Public Schools earlier in the decade, with smattering of success. And although it is a good move on the district’s part to do this, it must also look at the long-term curriculum and instruction issues that are among the underlying causes of students leaving before they graduate high school.
• A new relationship with teachers’ unions: Ever since the Progressive Policy Institute’s school reform efforts in the 1990s (then led by Eduwonk’s Andy Rotherham), centrist Democrats and a new generation of black leaders in the party have viewed the arguments made by teachers unions more skeptically than the rest of the base. Now that big-city mayors such as Chicago’s Richard Daley and Adrian Fenty of Washington, D.C., are taking control of traditional public school districts, the unions are getting even less sympathy. This, along with the development of groups such as Joe Williams’ Democrats For Education Reform and primary victories by its supporters — including Denver’s Jared Polis — is making things less comfortable for the AFT and NEA. Mickey Kaus finally realizes this while in Denver during coverage of a Democratic convention shindig. (Hat tip to Joanne Jacobs).

The real question isn't about the effectiveness of vouchers, but about assuring every child gets a chance at a high-quality education that gets each one on the path to success in their life. (Photo courtesy of Viewimages)

NEWS AND COMMENTARY FROM AROUND the dropout nation. Updates are marked with an *:

• Widespread academic failure — on an international scale: Last week, during a debate with immigration skeptic Norman Matloff, he disputed my citing of PISA and TIMMS international testing results, which showed American students scoring in the 95th percentile — the nation’s best students — trailing their peers in ten countries. He continued arguing that the academic underperformance was merely limited to an “underclass” of poor students, even though these are unlikely to be the poorest students and more likely to be the product of middle-class households. Now, at Edspresso, Vicki Murray and Evelyn Stacey of the Pacific Research Institute offer more evidence that academic failure and underperformance extends beyond the poorest Americans. Half the students at one in every ten middle-class California schools, for example, are failing the state’s CST standards test.
• The source of academic struggle: EducationNews.org’s Michael Shaughnessy interviews George Leef, who had written a piece earlier this week on the woeful math instruction training at America’s education schools. Leef offers another reason why many teachers have become inept at teaching math: “Many students grow up with teachers who have been trained to think that feeling good is more important than getting correct answers.” And the administrators and the parents sometimes engage in the same garbage. Why does anyone think social promotion — moving kids from grade to grade despite failing school — continues to exist despite evidence that it is an abject failure?
  
• The value of vouchers: Edsize’s Leo Casey accuses voucher supporters of cherry-picking studies that support their positions. Jay Greene responds by listing a series of different studies proving the value of the school choice plans. Greg Forster joins the fray by offering the Milton and Rose D. Friedman Foundation’s latest report on the Ohio voucher program. Andrew Coulson also joins in on the fun. All of this began with Greene demanding that Casey and his allies in the Broader, Bolder Coalition submit their concept for school reform to major study.
• At least the argument isn’t pointless like the debate over whether it is proper for the latest book released by Fordham to have “Paternalism” in the title. Or the debate among priests over how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.
  
• And the usefulness of national standards: Neil McCluskey of Cato calls out Fordham and Mike Petrilli for not responding to McCluskey’s question (and that of Eduwonk’s Andy Rotherham) as to whether the political forces at the state level that often collide over development of curriculum standards won’t rear themselves during the development of national standards. Petrilli responds. All I’ll say is if you think the battle between advocates of phonics and supporters of whole language was rather nasty, wait until USDOE tries to develop standards for history. The NAACP, La Raza and the Knights of Columbus will get into this, along with the NEA, the AFT and the other usual suspects.
  
• Here is the REL WestEd study of dropouts and the revolving door at San Bernardino schools mentioned on Dropout Nation last week. Read. Think. Take action.
  
• But will they keep them there: Schools in Texas are trying to get dropouts to re-enroll in school. But they have until the end of September to make it happen. Or else they won’t get any money for them. Yes, it is always about the money.
  

The Town & Country Building is tackily tasty. But the school district isn't. (Courtesy of Agilitynut.com)

One wouldn’t think this town, two hours north of New York City, would be swamped with a dropout crisis. As a district bordering between farming country and suburbia, just 32 percent of the Liberty Central Schools District’s enrollment are Latino, black or Native American; the remaining 68 percent are white.

The district and its only high school, however, is as much a dropout factory as the collection of high schools that make up the far larger — and more diverse — Gotham system.

Fifty-six percent of the freshmen entering high school in the Liberty district actually graduated in four years, according to the New York State Education Department. Even worse, the problem isn’t simply among the few students with disabilities, whose graduation rate is an abysmal 21 percent. A mere 63 percent of Liberty’s freshmen in the general population garnered a sheepskin; two out of every five students either likely dropped out, failed to garner enough credits for graduation (which will likely lead them to leave without a diploma) or transferred to other school districts (from which they will likely drop out).

This isn’t a new trend. Just 56 percent of the 8th-graders who made up the district’s class of 2005 two years ago actually graduated in five years, according to an analysis of data submitted to the U.S. Department of Education; a mere 53 percent of the district’s freshmen walked away with a sheepskin in four years. This despite the fact that a not-so-great 74 percent of students were promoted from 8th-to-12th grade during that period.

What’s wrong with Liberty? The problems begin early. Just 13 percent of 4th graders scored in the Level 4 (r top percentile) range on the state’s standardized test, while 41 percent of Liberty’s 4th-graders had scores in the lowest levels of the test; the statewide average is, respectively, 21 percent and 41 percent. Twenty-one percent of Liberty’s 4th-graders scored in the lowest two levels of the math portion of the exam, higher than the 17 percent statewide average. Meanwhile, 64 percent of the district’s 8th-graders scored in the bottom two levels of the state’s English exam; only a merely attrocious 53 percent of the state’s 8th graders overall scored that low.

These are students woefully prepared to stay in school, much less graduate. Proving once again that the ills of dropout nation aren’t limited to the heart of Urban America.

Did she prove that she is ready for college and life? Did he? Depends on whether they passed the exit test.

THE CENTER FOR EDUCATION POLICY offers its latest evaluation of graduation exams. And for Indiana — whose Graduation Qualifying Exam is notorious for being a tad too easy (only tests 8th- and 9th-grade learning) and yet, so hard for some students to pass — the results are, well, underwhelming. This, unfortunately, is not only true for the Hoosier State, but for most of the other 25 states offering such exams.

Eight percent of the graduates in Indiana’s Class of 2007 garnered a sheepskin despite repeatedly failing the test. But, as I’ve reported last year, it’s actually worse than those numbers suggest when one looks at each district and high school. Indianapolis Public Schools, for example, 23.6 percent of the district’s Class of 2007 –281 students — graduated despite repeatedly flunking the graduation test. Sixteen percent of Greater Clark County School’s Class of 2007 repeatedly flunked the GQE, while 17 percent of South Bend Community Schools graduating class this year never passed the test (I’ll spare the Gary school district’s miserable numbers for all of us).

Thankfully, Indiana will replace the GQE by 2012 with a series of end-of-course tests in Algebra I and 10th-grade English. But the state isn’t eliminating the waiver process; students and parents will still have incentives for not passing the tests, while schools and districts will have no incentive to improve curriculum and instruction. This is also true for other states, which also refuse to hold students — and schools — accountable for lagging performance.

New York still allows students who passed a state Board of Regents-approved course to submit a “department-approved” test such as the SAT II — none of which are aligned with state standards — if they don’t pass that state’s end-of-course Regent’s exams. Across the Hudson River in New Jersey, 12 percent of students — 11,747 students — avoided passing the state’s High School Proficiency Assessment in order to grab their sheepskins.

And it’s even more laughable in Washington State, where the legislature approved a series of alternatives to passing the state exit exam there. A student who fails the exam can either compare his work to another student with a similar profile who actually passed the test, assemble a portfolio of work or get the slightly more rigorous total cut score of 1200 — way below the average SAT score of 1500 on the 2007 edition of the collegiate entrance exam — to get out of passing.

The results of these faulty regimes can be seen in the high numbers of students, both in major universities and community colleges, in the low levels of graduation and the high numbers of those students ending up in remedial education course. The fact that these students aren’t even being tested for the knowledge they need to even get into apprenticeship programs means that schools are poorly preparing them for the challenges of the global economy, in which math skills are so highly prized. And state policymakers, in turn, merely weaken the very standards they declare they want all students to learn. Education as both tragedy and farce at once.

The good news — if you can call it that — is that states are moving more toward end-of-course exams, which will force students to show that they have mastered the math, science, history and English knowledge they need in order to get into higher education of any kind, be it college, techinical school or trade apprenticeships. But high-stakes testing, contrary to the arguments of FairTest and other opponents of standardized testing regimes, remains more mythology than reality.

Let's encourage at-risk kids to get real diplomas, not meaningless feel-good certificates.

NEWS AND COMMENTARY inside — and outside — the dropout nation. Updates and new stories added throughout the day are marked with an *asterisk:

• The definition of insanity: School districts in Fort Bend, Texas, Houston, Saginaw, Mich., and Munster, Ind., are teaming up with local prosecutors and police departments to combat chronic truancy. Parents will be charged and fine for not keeping track of their children’s attendance while the kids themselves will be picked up. This isn’t a new tactic. The evidence that the sweep-and-fine method actually works to keep kids in school and gets them back on track towards graduation, however, remains elusive. More importantly, such programs don’t address one of the main reasons behind truancy: The low academic performance and lack of educational engagement (caused by not-so-rigorous curricula) of the children who often chronically skip school. Children realize their low academic performance even if they are getting promoted from grade to grade despite their low grades.
• The meaning of irresponsibility: The Senatobia School District in Mississippi — a state with an unbelievably awful record of academic failure — decided that it was time to offer General Education Development classes that will target 16-year-olds, according to The Democrat of Tate County. Yes, a school district decided to target teenagers that should be in school. Why gee whiz, why not simply offer the students free prison cells, liquor and Food Stamps at the same time. The school district should be finding ways to keep the 16-year-olds in school and on the path to graduation, not letting them drop out.
• Sadly, despite evidence that GEDs aren’t anywhere equivalent to a regular high school diploma, newspapers are reporting far too many feel-good stories about adults picking up one. One wonders if editors and reporters actually think these things through. Wait, I know far too well that they don’t.
• More Core Knowledge: Richard Whitmire reveals that the school reform outfit is unveiling a reading program and laments the end of Reading First.
• Kevin Carey reads Paul Tough’s piece on education reform in New Orleans and learns that, when it comes to parental involvement, schools need to be focused on that thing called parental engagement. Essentially, if schools want parents to get involved in student learning, they must also provide various levers by which they can be engaged.
• From where I sit, I also say that traditional public schools, public charters and private schools must also be willing to accept the reality that parents must be involved in education beyond just helping kids with the homework. Given the role that instructional methods can play in student learning and the reality that it is, at times, too easy for minority students to land in special education programs or not get into gifted programs, parents must also be actively involved in structuring how their children will learn. This won’t make administrators or teachers — the self-appointed experts in education — very happy. But it is key to stemming dropouts and gaining more involvement from parents.
• *Math teacher shortages, Volume XXX: California is making an ambitious — and frankly, overdue — move to require all 8th graders to learn beginning Algebra. For students — especially those who are not slated for the honors track that leads to college admission — such rigorous math work will help them gain the knowledge they need to get into whatever higher education option (be it college or trade programs) they choose upon graduation. Making the plan come into reality, however, is a problem because of a shortage of math teachers, notes the Sacramento Bee, a common problem throughout the nation. One possible solution should be alternative certification for mid-career professionals who want to get into teaching, but can’t afford to spend two-to-four years in ed school. Another is to finally begin offering higher pay for math and science positions; although it won’t lure all the math and science collegians into teaching — largely because the pay will still be lower than the incomes they can make in the tech sector and the reality that teaching is a harder job than most think it is — it will help alleviate those shortages. Attracting foreign math students and teachers into the profession through the use of skilled worker visas will also help; this is a reason why H-1B and other skilled immigration quotas should be increased or eliminated altogether.

New solutions must be undertaken if we want high-quality teachers in the classroom, especially in order to turn around the nation's dropout factories.

The dropout nation at a glance. Updated continuously throughout the day (new stories and updates marked with an *):

• Time for alternatives to teacher licensing? So suggests the San Francisco Chronicle, which peers into the licensing and test requirements for becoming a teacher in California and find it a tad onerous. The paper’s solution: Audition each teacher to see if they are qualified, something similar to the method teaching guru Martin Haberman uses to determine whether a teacher should be a candidate for his Star Teacher program.
• Although I agree with the Chron that the licensing requirements are a little much, the test-taking makes sense; you want teachers who have the subject-level competency needed in order to assure that every child gets a high-quality education. The real issue is that so much of teacher recruiting, training, licensing and recertifying in many states (actually, in all states to one degree or another) has little to do with actual instruction and subject-competency in the first place. Fifty-four percent of America’s teachers are trained in schools of education that are generally of low quality, according to former Teachers College president Arthur Levine in a 2006 report; the SAT score requirements are low as are other admission requirements, so the aspiring teachers (and the schools of education) are basically not ready for prime time. And most states don’t require teachers to actually take a subject-competency test before entering a teaching program; this means that many teaching students are coming in without having a strong knowledge base from which to educate students.
• Then there are the license renewal requirements: Thirty states require teachers to gain a master’s degree in order to have their licenses renewed; this, despite there being no research showing that earning an advance degree improves academic instruction or student academic performance, according to the most recent report by the National Council on Teacher Quality (disclosure, I am a co-author of the report). Eighteen states require districts to give raises to teachers based on additional graduate work, even though, again, there is no proof that such busywork will improve student learning. So teachers spend less time on improving their instructional skills and knowledge base and more time on gaining paper that will yield them better salaries and keep them employed. And you wonder why the quality of K-12 instruction is not where it should be.
• Teacher licensing should be focused on assuring that people with strong subject knowledge, polished in instruction and caring about children should be in the classroom. But this means restructuring schools of education, licensing renewal requirements and salary structures in order to make this happen. If you want more math and science teachers — both of which are in short supply — states must structure compensation to include salary differentials that can lure at least some aspiring math and science students into the field. At the same time, alternative teacher training programs that target baby boomer professionals looking for a second career after retirement, must also be part of the teacher supply landscape.
• *At the same time, the teacher compensation system — which rewards seniority and degree-accumulation over improving instructional method, subject-level competency and willingness to work with the hardest-to-teach students — must also be restructured. Simply raising salaries, as DC schools chieftain Michelle Rhee is attempting to do (in exchange for the elimination of tenure) isn’t enough. The problem isn’t simply a matter of money: There are shortages of teachers in math, science and special education positions; paying more for an indiscriminate number of teachers no matter their subject doesn’t solve the problem. Higher salaries need to be paid in high shortage positions while the entire compensation structure must be aimed towards improving instruction and knowledge base. Until those things are done, students will never get the kind of high-skilled teachers they need.
• *Speaking of Rhee: Fast Company has a profile of Rhee and her efforts to turn around the nation’s most pervasive academic failure complex. Thanks to Erin O’Connor and Critical Mass for the tip.
• Adding options for New York children: New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg polishes up an otherwise mediocre legacy as mayor with his pioneering work on education; this time, he is expanding the range of school choices for the city’s students and parents. Eighteen new charter schools will open this year, reports the New York Times, adding to the 50 schools currently open for business; 51 charters have been started since Bloomberg took office seven years ago.
• Who should prevail in accountability: Since the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act seven years ago, California has insisted on operating two different accountability systems — the federal AYP mandates and the state’s own Academic Performance Index — that don’t fully match up with one another in terms of expectations and performance indicators. The state’s Legislative Analyst’s Office takes a look at both AYP and API and find them wanting. It, instead, wants an accountability system that focuses on how school districts actually get the schools they oversee — especially those that are dropout factories and academic failure mills — up to speed. [Update: Link fixed per Jacqui Guzman. Thanks Jacqui.]
• Why running a school district ain’t easy, Volume 500: The Monitor in the Mexican border town of McAllen, Tx., takes a look at the tenure of outgoing district superintendent Yolanda Chapa. From accusations of forcing out a predecessor to complaints about her not having a doctorate (as if having a graduate degree results in tip-top school leadership) to the programs she started, one gets the sense that Chapa will be happy to get out of dodge and let someone else handle the mess.