Education attainment

Combining diplomas and GEDs, Kentucky is close to national average in high school completion by our youngest adults, but further behind in bachelors' degrees. The results shown come from Census Bureau files showing the average of results from its three most recent annual American Community Surveys.

JCPS reading plans, history

Monday night, the Jefferson County school board heard important district plans to raise reading performance. As reported by Chris Kenning in the Courier-Journal:

Changes currently, or soon to be, under way include having students more deeply analyze readings through discussion and writing; improving vocabulary instruction; adding teacher training; and restoring schools' focus on reading, which has been diluted by competing initiatives in math and science.

The district also will increase interventions for struggling students by requiring teachers to track their progress and change strategies if they're not working.

“The way instruction is being delivered now, it's at a superficial level,” the school district's literacy director, Lue Peabody, said in an interview, noting the changes are among a handful of recommendations provided by a panel of experts who reviewed the school district's practices last year.

Ms. Peabody's words are frank about current difficulties, and that's the essential foundation for building better future results.

In the same spirit, it's important to note a weakness at the end of the article:

Board member Linda Duncan said, “Our proficiency isn't where it needs to be, ” but praised the district for gains in reducing novice learners and for the changes they'd undertaken.

Jefferson County has not reduced novice readers. At the elementary level, novice reading performance increased from 2007 to 2008 and increased again from 2008 to 2009. At the middle school level, the same thing happened. At the high school level, novice reading did decline from 2008 to 2009, but the 2009 level is still higher than in 2007.

The numbers shown above come straight from the district's official Interim Performance Report from the Kentucky Department of Education, and more exactly from the reading trend pages available here.

(Yes, the district's Performance Reports for 2006 and early years showed a higher level of novice performance, but those results are not comparable. The Kentucky Core Content Test assessed different content from 1999 to 2006. It also used a different combination of testing items, was scored on a different scale, and had different cut points for separating novice and apprentice performance than the 2007-2008-2009 assessment. The word "novice" is the same, but the word is the only thing that can be validly compared.)

Chamber grades the states

The United States Chamber of Commerce has released a "report card" for all fifty states, including these "grades" for Kentucky:

• C in school management (includes standards, accountability, and charters, but not assessment)
• C in finance
• C in staff hiring and evaluation
• F in removing ineffective teachers
• B on data
• B on pipeline to postsecondary
• B on technology

Our best result is on the pipeline to postsecondary, where we show strength on requiring a college-ready curriculum, giving statewide college readiness tests, and diplomas with career readiness specialization options.

Our weakest, on removing ineffective teachers, comes from an NCES survey that asked principals which factors they saw as barriers to removing teachers. Kentucky principals were less likely to say that particular things were not barriers than their peers nationwide, as shown in the table below:

The Chamber's report focuses outside the classroom, perhaps expecting that indirect efforts are the best levers to change the direct process of how teachers work with students.

The McKinsey report's conclusion on top school systems across the globe, confirmed by Kentucky's reform experience, convinces me otherwise: the quality of teaching must be addressed directly. For that, the crucial issues are things like teacher preparation, teacher internships, professional development and collaboration, leadership development, leadership practice, intervention when individual students perform weakly (including formative use of assessment results), and intervention when whole schools perform weakly. The Chamber's effort is impressive and the specifics interesting, but the end result is not on the most important track for raising student performance.

As Michael Barber told the Prichard Committee in June, "the only way to improve outcomes is to improve instruction."

The uncertain C-J

Of particular concern to Kentucky is to ensure that educational progress is experienced throughout the state. The overall improvements that served to move Kentucky up in the rankings were not felt by all areas, or all schools, and the task force should work to see that all boats are lifted in the suggestions it makes.

That's from the Courier-Journal's Sunday editorial about the Governor's new education task force.

The editorial speaks part of the truth:"not all areas" have felt the overall improvement.

The editorial omits a central feature of that truth: The C-J's home turf is by far the largest of the "areas" that have not participated fully in the transformation all our schools need. In Jefferson County, the school system now ranks in the bottom fifth of districts statewide.

And the editorial leaves out another, closely-related truth: Jefferson County has financial, educational, and cultural wealth most Kentucky districts can barely imagine. Its schools ought to be the envy of the state. Excellence is entirely within their reach, but only with leadership that speaks frankly about current weak performance and boldly about the need for much higher achievement in the coming years. It is past time for that sort of leadership to arise and be heard in our largest school district.

"For if the trumpet makes an uncertain sound, who will prepare for battle?"

"Tidal wave of reform" at Prichard meeting (press release)

The press release for the Prichard Committee's November 2nd meeting is headlined 'Tidal wave of reform' focus of recent Prichard Committee meeting, and reports on the event as follows.

FRANKFORT, Ky. - An in-depth look at what Kentucky's new education commissioner has called "a tidal wave of reform" was the focus of the recent fall meeting of the Prichard Committee for Academic Excellence.

The words of Education Commissioner Dr. Terry Holliday describe several key developments that are expected to have a significant impact on the way Kentucky prepares its children to succeed as adults. The developments coincide with the recent arrival in Kentucky of two new education leaders: Holliday at the Kentucky Department of Education and Dr. Robert King, president of the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education.

King and Holliday emphasized to the committee (during its November 2, 2009, meeting in Frankfort) that they are working collaboratively to accelerate the improvement of Kentucky's schools in response to state and federal initiatives.

Robert F. Sexton, the committee's executive director, pointed out that such collaboration is both noteworthy and unprecedented. "This is the first time we've had both the commissioner of education and the president of the postsecondary education council address the committee at the same time," he said.

The committee's specific areas of interest included a groundbreaking piece of legislation enacted by the 2009 General Assembly, Senate Bill 1, and a federal funding initiative known as Race to the Top. Here is a closer look, based on presentations to the committee from Holliday, King, Rhonda Sims, director of the division of assessment support for the state Department of Education and David Cook, the department's project manager for Race to the Top:

• Some $4.25 billion is available nationally under the Race to the Top program but how much any individual state, such as Kentucky, could receive will depend on how many grants the federal government awards.
• Kentucky will need new strategies to improve badly failing schools to improve its prospects for receiving the federal funds.
• In addition to turning around low-performing schools, the federal criteria emphasize how states assure quality teaching, use data systems to measure student progress and develop and use rigorous standards and tests. Senate Bill 1 has improved Kentucky's position due to its mandate for new standards, testing and other requirements.
• The final federal guidelines are expected soon, and they could include a requirement that states allow the creation of charter-like schools. This would require legislation in Kentucky, which does not have a law on the books allowing charter schools, but state education officials are not considering a comprehensive charter-school program.
• Although state testing will continue while a new assessment system is developed under Senate Bill 1 for implementation in 2012, schools' scores on the state test will not be part of a state accountability system during the interim.
• Schools will continue to be held accountable for students' scores on the national No Child Left Behind test.
• A national effort to develop new standards for math and language arts - known as "common core" standards - could also lead to the creation of common assessments. Kentucky is part of this national effort.
• The Council on Postsecondary Education will soon develop a new strategic plan that is expected to include such elements as enhanced postsecondary support for elementary and secondary education; renewed focus on associate degrees in the community and technical college system; a greater emphasis on regional universities' areas of excellence; and more attention on research and graduate study at the state's research universities.

The committee also welcomed several new members:

• Alva Clark of Lexington, an attorney, parent and fellow of the Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership
• Louisville attorneys Matt Breetz and Franklin Jelsma
• Al Cornish, vice president of education and development for Norton Healthcare in Louisville
• Paula Fryland, executive vice president for corporate banking of PNC Bank, Louisville
• Roger Marcum of Lebanon, executive vice president of St. Catharine College and former superintendent of Marion County Public Schools.

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Long thinking about state and local reform

Together, the chapters in this volume suggest that student success is only possible in an educational environment that responds to and nourishes each child's individual curiosity, personal learning style, past experience, and cultural heritage. That environment, it is argued, is one where educators are highly flexible, free to adapt curriculum and instructional practices to particular pupils and situations, and able to inquire and deliberate systematically and regularly about how they might be yet more responsive to their students. That sort of environment can only be created by those who work within it: the staff, the students, the parents, and any actively involved citizens who voluntarily make the school part of their lives.

If that argument is correct, a good school requires a kind of yeast to rise, and people outside the school, including state officials, cannot supply that ingredient. That does not mean, however, that they cannot contribute, because inert resources like facilities and supplies remain important, and because inappropriate regulation, like too much salt in the bread dough, can cause the yeast to die. If state officials think carefully about what must be allowed to happen at each school, they can select those roles that make it possible for parents, teachers, and students to play effectively their distinctive roles in effective education.

The bread-baking metaphor should have mentioned that some warm accountability will also speed the yeasty work. Other than that, the analysis still seems sound to me sixteen years later. It's my own conclusion to an essay called "Beyond Micromanagement, Beyond Deregulation: the State Role in Effective Education Reform," published in Investing in U.S. Schools.

FAQ: What's a charter school?

Charter schools are publicly funded elementary or secondary schools that have been freed from some of the rules, regulations, and statutes that apply to other public schools, in exchange for some type of accountability for producing certain results, which are set forth in each charter school's charter.

That efficient definition, offered by the National Education Association, captures three of four key charter elements: public funding, flexibility, and accountability. An additional common expectation is that parents apply to have their children attend a charter school.

Kentucky currently does not have a charter school law. States that do have charter school laws may have an advantage in applying for federal Race to the Top funds, and creating a charter school statute may be part of the Department of Education legislative agenda in the coming session, as noted in this Herald-Leader report.

For a deeper sense of how charter schools operate, here's the definition proposed in the "New Model Law" recommended by the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools:

A ‘public charter school’ means a public school that:

• Has autonomy over decisions including, but not limited to, matters concerning finance, personnel, scheduling, curriculum and instruction;
• Is governed by an independent governing board;
• Is established, operating, and accountable under the terms of a charter contract between the school’s board and its authorizer;
• Is a school to which parents choose to send their children;
• Is a school that admits students on the basis of a lottery if more students apply for admission than can be accommodated;
• Provides a program of education that includes one or more of the following: pre-school, pre-kindergarten, any grade or grades from kindergarten through 12th grade, and adult community, continuing, and vocational education programs;
• Operates in pursuit of a specific set of educational objectives as defined in its charter contract; and
• Operates under the oversight of its authorizer in accordance with its charter contract.

In-state enrollment resumes (slow) growth

From 2003 to 2006, undergraduate study by Kentucky residents stopped growing, at least at public institutions. For 2007 and 2008, growth resumed, though at a much slower pace than we saw before 2003. Here's a snapshot of the overall numbers:

Of the roughly 2,700 additional in-state FTEs from 2006 to 2008, more 2,000 enrolled in the Kentucky Community and Technical College System.

In the same two year period, the four-year universities added just under 700 in-state FTEs.

These numbers provide an important update to State Auditor Crit Luallen's 2007 warning that in-state enrollment may be endangered by rising tuition. The disturbing enrollment trend she noted has improved at least slightly, though not enough to put Kentucky on track to meet our statewide 2020 target of matching national educational attainment.

Data source: "Full-Time Equivalent Enrollment by Residency and Level - Public Institutions - Fall"reports from the Council on Postsecondary Education.

Think tank pushes higher education accountability

Inside Higher Education has the story:

The Center for American Progress has impeccable credentials for the Obama era. In the same way that the right-leaning Heritage Foundation and American Enterprise Institute had the attention of the Bush administration, the Center for American Progress, headed by the former Clinton confidante John Podesta, is the think tank for the current White House. Time magazine called the center "Obama's idea factory" after his election last year.

Which makes the center's new white paper on higher education all the more interesting -- and, perhaps, all the more concerning to some college leaders.

The document, "Putting the Customer First in College," calls on the U.S. Education Department to create an Office of Consumer Protection in Higher Education that would (1) pressure colleges to produce significantly better data on how well they serve students, (2) develop a system for making that data available for students to use in choosing a college, and (3) direct students unhappy with their colleges' educational practices to federal, state, or accrediting officials who can help them resolve their complaints.

Read the full article here, and the full report here.