As most readers know, I live in Texas. My elected representatives are quite conservative on issues related to federal involvement in education.
Their point of view is grounded in the U.S. Constitution, which places control over education firmly in the hands of states. It also finds expression in the bipartisan Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which reversed what many saw as the No Child Left Behind Act’s efforts to assert federal control over everything in K-12 education, from school accountability measures to definitions of highly qualified teachers.
However, elected representatives on both sides of the aisle recognize that the federal government can and should help improve K-12 education by providing funding to ensure that all students receive an appropriate education.
Title IIA, a program that supports educator recruitment, training, mentoring, and induction via poverty-weighted formula grants, represents one serious effort by the federal government to ensure that every student has access to well-trained teachers every day. All of us at Learning Forward believe that Title IIA’s annual investment in teachers is vital, and we are working hard to make sure that Congress and the Administration understand this program’s value and support funding it adequately. From my perspective, proposals to deeply cut or eliminate Title IIA, which Congress is currently mulling, would be devastating.
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On December 10, 2015, the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) was signed into law by President Obama. This bipartisan measure reauthorized the 50-year-old Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), the nation’s national education law. The New York State Education Department has established an ESSA Think Tank that will assist the New York State Education Department (NYSED or “the Department”) with development of New York’s ESSA state plan, which we anticipate that the Department will be required to submit to the United States Department of Education (USDE) in early 2017.
ESSA retains many of the core provisions of No Child Left Behind (the previous reauthorization of ESEA) related to standards, assessments, accountability, and use of Federal funds. However, ESSA does provide states with much greater flexibility in many areas, including the methodologies for differentiating the performance of schools and the supports and interventions to provide when schools are in need of improvement. To meet the requirements of ESSA, New York will also be required to submit a new state plan to USDE for the use of a wide array of Federal grant programs, including Title IA (Improving Basic Programs Operated by Local Educational Agencies, Title IB (State Assessment Grants, Title IC (Education of Migratory Children), Title ID (Prevention and Intervention Programs for Children and Youth who are Neglected, Delinquent or At-Risk), Title IIA (Supporting Effective Instruction), Title III (Supporting Language Instruction for English Learners and Immigrant Students), Title IVA (Student Support and Academic Enrichment Grants), Title VB (Rural Education Initiative), and Title VI (Indian, Native Hawaiian, and Alaska Native Education).
By Stephanie Hirsh
