In early February President Bush proposed his federal budget for FY2007. The main focus of his education budget is to support new math and science instruction, high school reform, and strengthen foreign language learning deemed important for national security (see also last item on International Education Summit).

A 4.6 percent increase in No Child Left Behind (NCLB) spending includes increased resources under the American Competitiveness Initiative which promotes stronger instruction in math, science, and foreign languages in early grades, and more challenging coursework (such as college-level Advanced Placement courses) in high schools.

The President proposes extending the accountability measures of NCLB under the High School Reform Initiative with:

• targeted interventions to improve the performance of students at risk of failing to meet state standards; and
  
• expanded high school assessments to help increase accountability and meet the needs of at-risk students.

For details on the budget proposals read the Department of Education’s press release.

(Source: Education Innovator, February 9, 2006)

Education Week has published its Quality Counts report, an annual look at the progress of education reform in the USA.

Quality Counts 2006, the 10^th edition of the report, looks at a decade of standards-based education and its effect on student achievement. Progress is measured state by state, plus the District of Columbia, on a core set of policy indicators: standards, assessments, accountability and efforts to improve teacher quality.

According to the report states’ standards, tests and accountability measures can be linked to positive gains in students’ scores in the National Assessment for Educational Progress (NAEP) tests in reading and math in grades 4-8 (9-13-year-olds) from 1996 to 2005.

However, the report found that state implementation of teacher quality policies had a negative impact on achievement gains in both math and reading.

The most notable beneficiaries of the standards-based measures were low-income and minority students who made the most progress on achievement levels. The study suggests that there is still a great deal to accomplish in closing the achievement gap.

(Source: Education Week January 4, 2006)

President Bush marked the fourth anniversary of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law at an elementary school in Maryland which has reported a significant closing of the achievement gap between minority students and their white peers.

The NCLB Act mandates annual testing aligned to state standards and a number of accountability measures, including report cards showing annual student progress, and a “highly qualified” teacher in every classroom. It was enacted to contend with “the soft bigotry of low expectations”.

States’ progress toward full compliance of the law often depends on the kind of testing and standards they had in place prior to NCLB.

A major criticism of the law is that it is under-funded and places an unfair burden on states. The US Department of Education rejects that claim saying that targeted funding has increased as a result of the law.

Although NCLB is still controversial for many in the education community for its scope and demands, its basic principles seem to be taking hold as a part of the education culture.

For more information, go to the Department of Education’s No Child Left Behind website.

Read the White House press release on the 4^th anniversary visit.

The under-performing Philadelphia school district was taken over by the state of Pennsylvania in December 2001. It is the country's eighth largest school district with 264 schools and 210,000 students. As a result of the take-over, the management of many individual schools was outsourced to private organizations.

Research for Action (RFA), a Philadelphia-based non-profit organization, is carrying out a long-term analysis of the privatization experiment and in this report of progress so far says that Philadelphia is an example of “how an urban district attempts to couple large-scale outsourcing of school management to private providers – each of which potentially brings a distinctive approach to school improvement – with a considerable number of district-wide policies and initiatives.”

The state introduced the following district-wide reforms:

• Allowing education management organizations (EMOs) to run individual schools
• Establishing a core curriculum and a system of benchmark exams
• Expanding elementary schools to include the middle school grades and creating smaller high schools
• Enforcing a zero-tolerance discipline policy
• Mandating extended day programs.

In brief, this early analysis by RFA points to the lack of real competition among the different providers which would necessitate higher standards. It also notes that the continued oversight in many areas by the school district, although at times welcomed by the EMOs, weakens their autonomy.

Download and read Privatization ''Philly Style'': What Can Be Learned from Philadelphia's Diverse Provider Model of School Management

(Source: The Education Gadfly January 12, 2006)

A new study identifies leadership strategies for engaging community stakeholders to create effective community schools.

Community schools work with both public and private partnerships to offer a range of services which support students, their families, the schools and the community. Schools are open every day, including weekends, and into the evening.

The Institute for Educational Leadership is carrying out the study and more details are given in the article Engaging the Community: Strategies that Work

More information on community schools is available at the Coalition for Community Schools.

Florida’s state supreme court has ruled that vouchers are unconstitutional, violating the principle of providing a “uniform” public school system for all children. (Vouchers are publicly-funded aid which enables students to attend independent schools.) The court argued that the voucher program diverts public monies away from the public school system to private schools which do not present a uniform standard.

Known in Florida as Opportunity Scholarships, around 700 students use vouchers to attend independent schools.  The vouchers provide $4,350 per student for tuition.

Voucher programs are well-established in Cleveland and Milwaukee where they have also withstood court challenges, in particular that they violate the separation of church and state in education. (Many voucher recipients attend Roman Catholic schools.) The religious issue was not addressed by this state supreme court as the focus of the ruling was on the uniformity of education available.

Florida has other school choice programs for low-income students such as the McKay Scholarships which enable students with disabilities to attend private schools. Although this ruling is on the Opportunity Scholarships, there is speculation that other school choice options will be affected, including the more popular charter school movement.

For more details School Choice provides pro-voucher information and the National Education Association, one of the largest teachers’ unions, sets out the case against vouchers.

(Sources: Education Week 1/11/06; 1/18/06)

The Education Commission of the States has looked at the research findings from 91 studies and summarized them into a question and answer format for policymakers interested in teacher recruitment and retention.

The eight questions it poses are:

• What are the characteristics of those individuals who enter teaching?
• How do those individuals who remain in teaching compare with those who leave?
• What are the characteristics of schools and districts most likely to be successful in recruitment and retention of teachers?
• What impact do the working conditions in schools have on their ability to recruit and retain teachers?
• What impact does compensation have?
• What impact do various strategies related to teacher preparation have?
• What impact do induction and mentoring have?
• What is the efficacy of particular recruitment strategies and policies in bringing new teachers into the profession, including specifically targeted populations?

Download and read Eight Questions on Teacher Recruitment and Retention: What Does the Research Say?

(Source: Education Week November 30, 2005)

The Corporation for National and Community Service has issued the results of a national survey carried out on the volunteering habits of teenagers.

It finds that 55 percent of 12-18-year-olds (about 15.5 million teenagers) volunteered in 2004 compared to 29 percent of adults in the same year. Only five per cent of the youth surveyed said that their volunteerism was mandatory.

The study, carried out in collaboration with the US Census Bureau and Independent Sector (a coalition of charitable groups), analyses the relationship between the level of volunteerism and the three major social institutions: family, religious congregations, school (volunteering for credit, known as ‘service learning’).

For more information read Youth Helping America—Building Active Citizens: The Role of Social Institutions in Teen Volunteering

(Source: Education Week December 14, 2005)

President Bush proposed his federal budget for FY2007 in early February. The effects on higher education include:

• the American Competitiveness Initiative. The budget will call for spending $5.9 billion on a range of initiatives aimed at increasing investments in research and development, strengthening education, and encouraging entrepreneurship and innovation: increased budgets for the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, and reforming the immigration system to attract and retain highly-skilled foreign workers;
  
• a proposal for Career Advancement Accounts of up to $3,000 that workers and people looking for work can use to obtain training and other employment services;
  
• grants of up to $1,300 to high-achieving first- and second-year students who have completed a rigorous high school curriculum;
  
• third- and fourth-year students majoring in math, science, technology, engineering or critical foreign languages, and maintaining high grades, could receive up to $4,000 annually;
  
• $17,500 per teacher in expanded teacher loan forgiveness for highly qualified math, science and special education teachers serving challenging, low-income communities;
  
• Pell Grants, federal student aid for low-income students, to remain at a maximum of $4,050 per year (the same level as the past five years);
  
• abolition of all federal vocational education programs, including the Carl D Perkins Vocational and Technical Education program which currently receives $1.3 billion (of which 40 percent goes to community colleges for workforce development for low-income individuals).
  
  The funding would be re-directed to the High School Reform Initiative (see first item in Update). States and school districts could use the funding for vocational education and high school/college partnerships.
  
  President Bush tried unsuccessfully to eliminate the Perkins program last year but it enjoys strong bi-partisan support in Congress and its budget was eventually cut by one percent.
  
• Expansion of a program for community colleges to train workers in high demand fields (such as health care and information technology)

(Source: The Chronicle of Higher Education February 7, 2006)

The National Center for Higher Education Management Systems (NCHEMS) has released a report looking at the impact of state higher education inequality.

According to the report the topic is important for policymakers at the state level, where most higher education decisions are made, in light of:

• the population of the USA becoming increasingly diverse
  
• competition to the USA for the title of ‘most highly educated nation’
  
• the widening achievement gap between whites and minorities
  
• the lower earnings of minorities and the economic consequence
  
• the under-representation of minorities in higher education

The report looks at how states are addressing disparities in higher education and makes projections on how states will fare if current policies are not successful. It predicts that educational and income attainment will decline among Americans if states do not do more to improve college success rates for minority students.

Read As American Becomes More Diverse: The Impact of State Higher Education Inequality.

(Source: NACAC Research Update, November 14, 2005)

The following report, part of the Social Science Research Council Project Transition to College: From Theory to Practice explores what research tells us about the ability of all Americans to access, and succeed in, postsecondary education.

Working from the premise that higher education is crucial for the social, economic and political welfare of all Americans, but is not serving a large segment of the population, the report provides an overview of the research available over the last decade. It raises concerns that policymaking can occur in a vacuum without recourse to the relevant information available on this complex issue.

The report is divided into four areas: preparation, access, paying for college, and retention/success. Each section ends with areas of inquiry for researchers and policymakers to stimulate further study based on current gaps in knowledge.

Download and read the announcement or the full report Questions That Matter: Research Agenda on Access and Success

(Source: NACAC Research Update, November 14, 2005)

The Department of Education and State Department co-hosted the US University Presidents Summit on International Education in early January. The aim of the summit was to emphasize the continued importance of international education to the national interest - both in bringing overseas students to the USA and ensuring young Americans spend time abroad.

The number of overseas students seeking to study in the USA has fallen overall since 2001. Reasons include geo-political issues, increased competition from the UK and Australia, and complaints of a more cumbersome US visa process.

According to the Department of Education less than 2 percent of American undergraduate students study abroad in any given year.

The summit sought to engage university leaders in partnerships which would bolster international education and help ensure that the USA retains its place as a world leader in education, science and technology.

President Bush announced the National Security Language Initiative (NSLI) at the summit.

NSLI aims to strengthen Americans' competence in languages, in particular "critical need" languages such as Arabic, Chinese, Russian, Korean, Hindi, Farsi and Urdu. The President is proposing a budget of $114 million for FY2007 for

• incentives to study those languages
• scholarships for short and long-term study abroad
• a Language Teaching Corps to get 1,000 new language teachers in schools by 2010
• an E-Language Learning Clearinghouse to deliver online resources to students and teachers
• an expansion of Teacher-to-Teacher seminars
• more partnerships between universities and K-12 schools to teach languages.

For more information read the Department of Education's press release on the NSLI.

The summit attendees were given a long list of measures for working with the government to push forward the international education agenda, including

• the state department proposal to organize delegations of higher education leaders to travel overseas promoting American education
• the Fulbright Science and Technology Award - a single worldwide competition to bring the best students to the USA. Universities would be asked to help by covering their tuition.

For more details, including presentations by high ranking speakers and a chart giving an overview of international student and scholar mobility to and from the USA in recent years, visit the US University Presidents Summit.