This morning, Politico.com has a roundup of reactions to the new legislation–the Every Student Succeeds Act–that will replace the disastrous No Child Left Behind, under which almost every public school in the nation was a “failing” school. Please note that former Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings is very unhappy that NCLB has been rewritten to remove the punishments. So now we have ESSA, and now we wait for that happy day to arrive when “every student succeeds” because of federal legislation.
GETTING TO KNOW ESSA: The education world is eagerly awaiting a bill expected early next week that could replace No Child Left Behind – and waivers, too – by the end of the year. So what’s going to be in the Every Student Succeeds Act? A lot has been written (some of it by us) but Morning Education will be laying out even more on the forthcoming bill, based on information currently available, in the days to come. Spot something interesting and wonky in an outline or draft bill? Send it our way.
– The new SIG: The framework for updating NCLB includes a 7 percent set-aside in Title I for school support and improvement. Schools will receive the funds for plans that are “evidence-based,” and the framework has language laying out the bar those plans will have to meet in order to qualify as “evidence-based.” Districts and schools will also have to consult with teachers, parents, principals and others when they’re putting together plans for school improvement.
– The new tests: The framework allows for computer-adaptive tests that were hard to use under NCLB, which required all students to take the same tests. That made it difficult to measure progress made by students who were either above or below their grade level. Fordham Institute President Michael Petrilli said he’s “especially glad” to see this provision because it “should open the door to true adaptive tests, which will lead to lots more accuracy for kids way above or below grade level (and thus more accuracy in their growth scores – important for schools and teachers).”
– Joel Packer has the roundup of which programs are funded, and by how much, based on details currently available: http://bit.ly/1leOqj8.
– Mailbag: Maggie Severns’ story about how many on the left fear that the bill could hurt poor and minority kids [http://politico.pro/1LuNeNT ] elicited this response from an education advocate who’s been involved with the reauthorization process: “There seems to be collective amnesia about waivers among the chattering class,” the advocate said. “Under waivers, individual groups of students don’t have to matter at all in school ratings. And when it comes to improvement action, states and districts are invited to ignore all but a small fraction of schools with under-performing groups.” Ultimately, the new agreement “gets us back closer to the intent of Title I: Expectations and support for vulnerable students.”
– Bush-era Education Secretary Margaret Spellings slammed the rewrite while in Austin earlier this week, Houston Chronicle reports: http://bit.ly/1R2wF2Z. But Sen. Patty Murray sang its praises at a Seattle elementary school last week. The Columbian: http://bit.ly/1P4ZVXF.
And then there is a wail of anguish from the once-liberal, now conservative Brookings Institution about the AERA blast at VAM. For VAM-lovers, who want to use test scores as both the measure and goal of education, the AERA statement (as well as a statement by the American Statistical Association) is a punch in the gut:
TEACHER EVALUATION NIRVANA: Brookings is critiquing a recent policy statement from the American Educational Research Association that was skeptical of using value-added scores when making decisions about teachers. AERA said the conditions needed to make VAM scores accurate can’t be met in many cases: [http://politico.pro/1Tbil7y ]. But Michael Hansen, deputy director of the Brown Center on Education Policy, said VAM should be measured in the context of other performance measures, “not relative to a nirvana that does not exist.” Alternatives to VAM like teacher observation have their own problems, he wrote. He agreed with AERA that more research would be valuable, but argued, “If we are looking for a performance measure that has zero errors, we ought to abandon performance evaluation altogether.” More: http://brook.gs/1QER2Ej
Brookings turned rightwing when it hired Grover Whitehurst, the George W. Bush education research director, as leader of its education program. Instead of being a neutral referee of education policy, Brookings became an advocate for choice and high-stakes testing.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
To speak to Hansen’s hysterical rant, I do not know of anybody claiming a zero percent error rate is the only acceptable measure. Of course, Hansen would not like to be in that .01% error rate if flying on a jet or on the operating table. The willingness to sacrifice so many good teachers on the alter of VAM silliness seems acceptable to Reformers – except of course if they are the ones unfairly affected. Or even if they were themselves held accountable, that would be a revelation to these hapless “experts”.
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No reformer has been able to answer this all-important VAM related question:
With the majority of us teaching “un-tested” subjects, how can anyone claim that a fair evaluation can be made using test scores from a subject (or students) that a teacher does not teach?
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“The framework allows for computer-adaptive tests that were hard to use under NCLB, which required all students to take the same tests. That made it difficult to measure progress made by students who were either above or below their grade level.”
Anything to help you with your measurements, Mr. Petrilli.
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Of course, there’s STILL no way to “measure progress,” because the content changes every year! There’s no way to tell if a student is “progressing” when one year math is algebra and another year is geometry, or one year science is life science and one year is physical science. They’re not measuring the same content, so there’s no valid way to measure progress, if standardized tests are valid, which they are NOT.
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Did they leave in the requirement that public schools report how often they’re testing in order to meet the wholly arbitrary “2%” number?
That looked expensive and time-consuming to me.
I recognize they’re under pressure from the public to stop pushing standardized tests, but that cure is worse than the disease. I bet testing will diminish when they stop tying everything to testing. I don’t know why public schools have to meet another reporting requirement to get where they were going anyway without Congress.
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“The new tests: The framework allows for computer-adaptive tests that were hard to use under NCLB, which required all students to take the same tests. That made it difficult to measure progress made by students who were either above or below their grade level. Fordham Institute President Michael Petrilli said he’s ‘especially glad’ to see this provision because it ‘should open the door to true adaptive tests, which will lead to lots more accuracy for kids way above or below grade level (and thus more accuracy in their growth scores – important for schools and teachers).’ ”
Whoa – how are we going to compare and stank rank kids and their teachers if everybody doesn’t take the same tests? Thought that was a main driver for CCSS?
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I had 4 children go thru a public school district that is half lower and low income kids, and I have never once heard a school board member or public school administrator say poorer children “can’t learn”. The last school meeting I attended they spent most of the time trying to come up with a way to improve attendance for the lower income students.
Is that an “excuse”? I don’t think so. It seemed to be just a recognition of a practical, immediate problem and a discussion of how to address it.
Maybe she can name names- which school board member or administrator said that?
“Always ready” sounds like she’s heard it a lot.
“School districts and board members are always ready with an excuse as to why some children, especially those in poverty, can’t learn.”
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Ever notice how ridiculous these Laws are named? Really … Think 180 degrees from the name of he law. Still awful. I am NOT clapping. Don’t be snookered.
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I’m not clapping.
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None of the VAM garbage addresses the problem of students who just bubble. In Utah the tests are meaningless to the students. Last year, one of my best readers scored lower than anyone else in the class.
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Just want to say, that I was outraged (but not surprised) with NPR’s one sided treatment on Morning Edition today of the NCLB compromise today titled: “Goodbye, No Child Left Behind” straight from their “Ensure a Reauthorized ESEA Protects Children and Civil Rights” letter playbook. They only featured a brief statement by Lamar Alexander. Of course, I am also upset at Elizabeth Warren championing the “The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights” talking points. Has she actually spent time in a school lately?
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