Around three hundred New York City schools are to be given greater autonomy in exchange for higher performance.

New York City is the nation’s largest school district with 1,400 schools serving 1.1 million students. The principals at the new “empowerment schools” will have power over hiring, budget, and curricula and $150,000 (₤76,142*) to spend at their discretion.

The move is an extension of Mayor Bloomberg’s “autonomy zone”, a pilot project which gave 48 New York City schools greater autonomy in an otherwise highly centralized system. Those schools are included in the new project. The list of also includes some charter schools (which already operate independently), some of the new small schools established in the city, and large high schools. Mayor Bloomberg has had control of the city’s schools for four years.

If the schools meet their accountability goals they will receive additional funding. If they fail after two years to make the grade, the principal’s job will be at stake.

Principals will be organized into network support groups and will receive training in the data management necessary to track students’ achievement.

The move is strongly opposed by the local union, the Council for School Supervisors and Administrators, which is in protracted discussion with the city over contracts.

View the current list of empowerment schools.

* Exchange rate for December 06: $1.97 = 1 GBP

(Sources: Education Week June 21, 2006; Gotham Gazette June 2006)

The National Center for Educational Accountability (NCEA) has issued a series of reports examining why some schools outperform their institutional peers and identifying commonalities of teaching and learning practices.

The NCEA, an organization aimed at raising standards and student achievement, looked at nearly 200 schools, from elementary through high school, in 20 states. It studied top and average performing schools using the NCEA’s ‘best practice framework’ to structure its findings.

The framework studies similarities across five major themes: curriculum and academic goals; staff selection, leadership and capacity building; instructional programs, practices and arrangements; monitoring: compilation, analysis, and use of data; and recognition, intervention and adjustment.

The high performing schools exhibited the following similarities: high expectations of students; no streamlining based on ability; decisions about curricula based on student data; and collaboration between teachers and administrators.

For more information read Best Practice Studies and Institutes: Findings from 20 States.

(Source: The Education Gadfly July 20, 2006)

Michigan has the third largest number of students attending charter schools (after California and Florida). Its 230 charter schools serve nearly 100,000 students (more than 5 percent of the state student population).

The state was one of the nation’s first to enact charter legislation in 1993. Michigan witnessed rapid growth with many charter schools opened by for-profit Educational Management Organizations (EMOs). Rapid growth was accompanied by problems with quality leading to a statutory limit placed on the number of newly-authorized charter schools.

The EMOs have been criticized for the dominant role they play in the state’s charter schools – they run nearly 75 percent of them – with allegations of corruption and profiteering. Furthermore Michigan’s charter schools perform only marginally better than schools in the state’s urban districts – and well below statewide averages.

Despite this, parental demand for an educational alternative for their children remains high.

A new report, Maintenance Required: Charter Schooling in Michigan, provides an overview of the system, along with its successes, failures, and challenges. It also offers recommendations for improvement to a state which is focusing heavily on charter school quality.

(Source: Education Sector, October 2006)

A partnership between Phildadelphia’s public schools and the Microsoft Corporation has resulted in a new high tech high school in a disadvantaged part of the city.

Dubbed, temporarily, the School of the Future it boasts the latest technological features such as a tablet personal computer for every student, interactive digital whiteboards, wireless network, customized educational software, and digital ‘smart cards’ for lockers and use in the canteen.

The building itself is notable for its energy efficient design and bright, adaptable spaces.

Neither Microsoft nor the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation paid for the school. The $62 million (₤31.5 m*) came from the Philadelphia school district’s capital fund. However Microsoft designed the school and, using its business techniques, created an ‘education competency wheel’ – a set of 37 work skills for staff and students.

The Philadelphia school district has been watched carefully since it embarked on a widespread privatization experiment in 2002. The current CEO, Paul Vargas, originally approached Microsoft about a partnership in 2003.

The school has other corporate partners including England’s Promethean Group Technologies Ltd which provides the school’s whiteboards. One of the largest contributors so far is Bowland Charitable Trust, also based in Blackburn, England, which donated $2 million (₤1 m*) and hopes to promote exchanges between Philadelphia and other urban schools.

The school will educate children from the surrounding neighborhood – up to 75 percent – with the rest coming from other parts of the city. Almost all the students are African-American, 10 percent have special needs and 85 percent are poor. The school has capacity for 750 students.

In order to graduate the students will be expected to have fluency in a second language, complete a research project, and demonstrate eleven '21st century skills' such as time management and problem solving. They must also apply to college or university.

Local universities, Villanova, Drexel and the ivy-league Pennsylvania, will provide support in the form of online tutoring, teaching classes, and use of library resources.

Find out more about Building the School of the Future from Microsoft.

* Exchange rate for December 06: $1.97 = 1 GBP

(Sources: Education Week September 20, 2006; Education Innovator October 13, 2006)

Concern over increasing drop-out rates and the need for remediation in college has focused more attention on high school reform from the general public to the federal government (President Bush wants to extend the principles of the No Child Left Behind Act to high schools.)

A report from MDRC looks at three high school reform initiatives addressing the challenges of improving low-performing schools (which tend to have high numbers of minority students and be in urban and certain rural areas).

The report looks at Career Academies, First Things First, and Talent Development. These three initiatives operate in some 2,500 high schools with components of their models found in thousands more.

The report looks at what does and does not work focusing on five major challenges:

•creating a personalized and orderly learning environment

•assisting students who enter high school with poor academic skills

•improving instructional content and practice

•preparing students for the world beyond high school

•stimulating change in overstressed high schools.

According to the report the “overall message of this synthesis is that structural changes to improve personalization and instructional improvement are the twin pillars of high school reform.”

Read the executive summary and full report of Meeting Five Critical Challenges of High School Reform: Lessons from research on three reform models.

For additional information on high school reform, read a policy brief from the American Youth Policy Forum.

(Sources: Education Week May 10, 2006; American Youth Policy Forum e-bulletin May 2006)

Entrepreneurship education got a boost in the early summer when the House passed the National Entrepreneurship Week resolution. The resolution: 1) encourages the implementation of entrepreneurship education throughout the United States; 2) supports the goals of National Entrepreneurship Week; 3) requests that the President issue a proclamation calling on the Federal Government, state and local governments, schools, non-profit organizations and others observe National Entrepreneurship Week annually.

Visit the Consortium for Entrepreneurship Education for more information.

(Source: Association of American Community Colleges)

A new study by the Center on Reinventing Public Education at the University of Washington reveals how two different school districts, Milwaukee (Wisconsin) and Dayton (Ohio), are confronting the challenges posed by competition in public education.

In Milwaukee 25 percent of students, and 30 percent in Dayton, use public dollars to attend school outside the traditional system (such as charter schools or using vouchers at private schools).

The study shows how the different districts are responding to the pressures of school choice. It offers advice and guidelines to school districts, individual schools, and policymakers to help traditional public schools adapt successfully to the emerging competitive environment.

Read the policy brief, press release and full report: No Longer the Only Game in Town: Helping Traditional Public Schools Compete.

(Source: US Department of Education’s Education Innovator October 13, 2006)

The recent mid-term elections put control of Congress back in the hands of the Democratic Party for the first time since 1994.

Prior to the election the Democrats outlined their education agenda, focusing on college affordability and the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB).

The Democrats aim to lower student-loan interest rates and expand tax deductions for college tuition.

The NCLB, enacted in 2002, mandates annual testing in reading and math (in grades 3 to 8, generally ages 8 through 13) and holds schools accountable for student performance. For more detailed provisions of the Act, view information posted by the US Department of Education.

Key Democratic lawmakers, such as Senator Edward Kennedy, support reauthorization of NCLB. However, many of the newly-elected incoming Democrats bring criticisms from their constituencies and campaign promises to do something about it.

Education policy experts predict less change to NCLB than if the Republicans had retained control of Congress – which might have resulted in an expansion of the Act’s mandates. They suggest that Democrats may look at expanding interventions to help schools meet their current targets.

(Source: Education Week November 15, 2006)

In August President Bush signed legislation reauthorizing the Perkins Act which oversees federally-funded career and technical education (CTE), more traditionally known as vocational education.

The law allows for $1.3 billion (almost ₤660 m*) in federal funds to state and local work-related classes, programs and training.

The provisions of the law call for more academic accountability and states to provide a clearer plan of required CTE courses for individual students. States will have to report test scores and graduation rates more consistently.

An existing part of the Perkins Act, TechPrep, supports partnerships in workforce training between high schools and colleges. Under the reauthorized law, TechPrep will have new academic demands. States will also be given the flexibility of combining TechPrep funding with other Perkins-related grants.

President Bush had originally proposed redirecting funding for CTE to high school reform. However, the Perkins Act enjoys broad bipartisan support and the legislation to renew it passed Congress easily in the summer. The President signed the bill into law in August and it will remain in effect until 2012. The full title is the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Educational Improvement Act of 2006.

* Exchange rate for December 06: $1.97 = 1 GBP

(Sources: Education Week August 9 and 30, 2006)

The Workforce Strategy Center (WSC) has issued a practitioner’s guide to developing “career pathways” - defined as “a series of connected education and training programs and support services that enable individuals to secure employment within a specific industry or occupational sector, and to advance over time to successively higher levels of education and employment in that sector.”

Key features of career pathways:

• Target jobs in industries of importance to local economies

• Create avenues of advancement for current workers, jobseekers and future labor market entrants

• Increase supply of qualified workers for local employers in the target industries
  

Career pathways vary depending on the industry targeted. It is often a process of adapting existing programs and services and adding news ones where necessary. Community colleges can play an essential role in career pathways by working with partners in workforce development agencies and employer and labor groups to deliver targeted educational opportunities.

The guide describes the work of building regional career pathway partnerships; the roles that state leaders and agencies can play in helping to cultivate partnerships; and lessons learned so far in developing career pathways.

The guide cites examples of best practice in Arkansas, California, Kentucky, Ohio, Oregon and Washington.

For more information read The Career Pathways How-To Guide.

(Source: American Youth Policy Forum e-bulletin November 2006)

In September the Commission on the Future of Higher Education issued its final report on a national strategy for US higher education.

The Commission had been established a year ago to take a hard look at the higher education sector and report on how well it educates its students, how affordable it is, and whether it meets the economic and workforce needs of the country (see our November 05 Update for more background).

Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings has issued an action plan, based on the Commission’s findings, which proposes changes to higher education in the three main areas of accessibility, affordability and accountability.

It is suggested that the higher education community needs to do more to meet the needs of an increasingly diverse student population. They need more information on colleges, more affordable colleges, and better school preparation.  

In brief the action plan calls for:

• Accessibility - expanding the principles of No Child Left Behind to high school, increasing accountability, and aligning high school standards to college expectations.

• Affordability – increasing need-based aid and simplifying the complex financial aid process.

• Accountability – introducing a data base system similar to the one used for K-12 which will be used during the college search process. The US Department of Education will also provide matching funds to colleges and states that test students and report their results.

Secretary Spellings has also announced plans to review the process by which higher education institutions are accredited.

The final report has been criticized for being a watered down version of its much harder hitting draft documents. The drafts included a provision for stronger accountability measures.

For more details read the US Department of Education’s press release which has links to the final report A Test of Leadership; Charting the Future of US Higher Education, and a fact sheet on the action plan to implement the changes.

(Sources: New York Times August 11, 2006; Chronicle of Higher Education October 6 and November 16, 2006; Education Innovator October 13, 2006; International Education Council October 2006 newsletter)

Harvard University has announced that, from September 2007, it will discontinue its early-admission program. Known as ‘early action’ this program allows students to apply and receive a decision ahead of the regular admission cycle.

Harvard representatives say that the process disadvantages students from schools or families which do not have the resources to understand the system. At a time when Harvard is reaching out to under-represented groups, such as offering free tuition to students from low-income families, it is felt that the early action program does not fit well with its goals.

The university also says that there is a certain frenzy attached to the process and it also wishes to encourage students in their final year of high school to continue their studies throughout year.

An applicant admitted to Harvard under its current early action program does not have to commit to the university until the same date as regular applicants. This allows applicants to compare financial packages before making their choice.

Universities which offer early decision programs often require an early commitment from candidates. This works to the college’s benefit by ensuring a high quality pool of students.

Harvard does not lack for high quality applicants but it has said it will review this decision after a couple of years to see how it has affected the make-up of its student body.

The higher education community is watching to see if Harvard’s decision will start a trend. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Delaware had recently scrapped their early decision programs. Shortly after Harvard’s announcement, both Princeton and the University of Virginia followed suit, citing similar reasons to Harvard for their decision.

For more details read the article in the Harvard University Gazette.

(Source: Education Week September 20, 2006; Chronicle of Higher Education September 13 and 26, 2006)