NCLB tests – contrasts in taking a stand!

This is the time of the year when most school districts are completing their standardized testing as part of the NCLB requirements.  We all know that if we don’t administer these tests, we are in danger of losing federal funding in our school districts.  Here are two articles that an offer contrasting views of the yearly tests.

In Texas, this article caught my attention as a way to encourage students to do their best.  “Grand Prairie students who pass the state TAKS tests could get a present next year: eight days off from school.” How would you like some days off school for doing well on a state mandated test?  Sounds like a novel approach to me.

In an interesting contrast, in Washington, Mr. Chew, a science teacher refused to give the test and was suspended for two weeks.  “Carl Chew, 60, who teaches science, wanted to take a stand against a test he considers harmful to students, teachers, schools and families.”   Apparently, the test in Washington causes many physical ailments in students.  I wonder if all students across the nation get physical ailments because of the yearly battery of tests, or if it is just the test in Washington that is difficult?

Online School vs. Brick and Mortar Costs?

I am writing an article comparing the costs for an online school to a brick and mortar school. There are many articles (here and here) and reports (here and here) that discuss the costs for online learning, but I can’t find any that actually compare both.

I want to create a chart that shows cost items for brick and mortar schools in one column, cost items for online schools in the next column, and the cost items that are the same for both.

Can you help me out? What am I missing? (See my starting list below).

Cost Items for Brick and Mortar School Only

• Facilities (Buildings and maintenance)
• Security

Cost Items for Online School Only

• Space for offices and computer lab for students.
• Course Management System
• Course Content
• Computer and Internet access for teachers and students
• Communication device for teachers (e.g. cell phone)
• Technology Support (e.g. help desk, course updating, server maintenance)

Cost Items for Both Brick and Mortar School and Online School

• Administration
• Teachers
• Student Support (counseling, library)
• Special Education Services
• Professional Development
• Students
• Student Information System
• State Testing System
• Textbooks
• Courses and Course Outlines approved by Governing Board
• Access to Computers
• Evaluation of program

Report challenges NCLB

The report begins:

“The welfare of our nation rests heavily upon our system of public education.  We strive to provide all of our children with equal access to a high-quality, free education because we know that without it, our democratic way of life will be at peril.”

Twenty-five years ago, the publication “A Nation at Risk” suggested fundamental changes were needed in the education system in the United States.  The writers recommended strengthening high school graduation requirements, that colleges should adopt more rigorous and and measurable standards, and that more time be devoted to the “New Basics.”  I’m not sure what the new basics were, since I was just beginning my teaching career.  But, the clarion call for change lead to educational reform.

Now, the Forum for Education and Democracy, a think tank of educational thinkers, have issued “Democracy at Risk: The Need for new federal policy in education” – another clarion call for change.  The report enumerates a number of concerns:  the fact that more students live in poverty and lack health care than 35 years ago, U.S. students rank lower in international math and science assessments than they did a few years ago, and the number of high school graduates is declining – “we only graduate 70%” while other nations graduate all of their students.

The recommendations include improving teaching and teacher training, engaging communities, identifying research that show promising practices in education, and providing states with the money to provide more equitable educational opportunities for all students as well as giving “money for safe housing, health care, and other services to improve children’s success in school.”

“The challenge is clear: improving education and improving democracy go hand in hand.”

Education Week covers the news conference held earlier this week.

The 72-page document is a “must read” for anyone interested in improving education and educational access so that all students graduate with a high school diploma.

Dropout articles abound

In response to Secretary of Education Margaret Spelling’s speech in Detroit on Tuesday, April 22, there have been more than 350 news items regarding the event according to Google News.  Here are some of the highlights:

• The Dallas News printed an editorial on April 8 asking the question:  ” Did 20 percent of Dallas high schoolers fail to graduate on time in 2004, as the Texas Education Agency reports? Or did 56 percent of them fail to walk across the stage, as a group led by Colin Powell claims?  The truth is, no one really knows. And not just in Dallas. Across the nation, dropout numbers are as fungible as who won the Texas Democratic primary.  Which is why Margaret Spellings took action.”
• Diverse Issues in Higher Education reported what Ms. Spellings said:  “Dropouts from the class of 2007 alone will cost our nation more than $300 billion in lost wages, lost taxes and lost productivity…Increasing graduation rates by just 5 percent, for male students alone, would save us nearly $8 billion each year in crime-related costs.”
• Congressional Quarterly reported that overall, lawmakers are pleased with this direction.  “We have learned a great deal in the six years since NCLB was enacted. As policymakers, we have an obligation to take seriously those lessons and translate them into reforms,” said Rep. Howard P. “Buck” McKeon , R-Calif.
  
• From the Detroit Free Press (where Ms. Spellings unveiled the administration’s plans) – Saying the U.S. can’t afford to “waste so much human potential,” the nation’s top educator on Tuesday proposed requiring every state in the nation use the same formula to calculate high school graduation rates — an action she said is necessary to grasp the seriousness of the dropout problem.
• And from the New York Times:  “Ms. Spellings’s proposed regulations would require states to calculate their graduation rates in a uniform way by the 2012-13 school year, using a formula that in 2005 all 50 governors agreed to adopt. In the years since, only a dozen or so states have done so.Under the formula, graduation rates are calculated by dividing the number of students who receive a traditional high school diploma in any given year by the number of first-time ninth graders who entered four years earlier, adjusted for students who transfer in and out.”

New dropout regs proposed

Education Secretary Margaret Spellings has proposed new regulations for counting dropouts according to an article in the Los Angeles Times today.  In her remarks in Detroit, she said,

“Information is a powerful catalyst for change…the more information we have, the better able we are to demand improvement — and get it.”

The article suggested that the new regulations would only count students who complete school on time with a regular degree as “graduates.”  This will unify how graduates and drop outs will be counted.

The proposed new regulations, including the definition of a “graduate” are posted in the federal register and they will be taking comments for the next 60 days until the regulations may go into effect.

Daria Hall from the Education Trust commented,

For far, far too long, states have used graduation-rate definitions that are inaccurate, inconsistent and did not provide communities, parents, educators or policymakers with the information they need.

In previous posts, I have shared statistics about the dropout crisis that exists across the nation and this is a step forward to start dealing with this crisis — because one high school drop out in America is one too many!