In 2011, Arizona became the first state to adopt the most flexible school reform yet, an education savings account (ESA) plan. It provides parents who believe their child is poorly served in the local public school with an annual budget they can spend on a wide variety of accredited alternatives—not just private or parochial schools, but tutoring, online academies, special-needs services, and even computer equipment for home schooling.
More recently, five other states have followed Arizona’s lead: Florida, Mississippi, Nevada, Tennessee, and just this year North Carolina. Initially these programs were designed to better serve learning-disabled children, but with the realization that most of its students could be educated independently for a fraction of public-school per pupil spending, Nevada authorized a plan open to any of that state’s children in 2015.
To date, Democrats in the Nevada legislature have held up funding for about 10,000 applicants, but nearly all of Arizona’s K-12 children are now eligible for an ESA worth 90 percent of their district’s per pupil spending.
With this history in mind, Marty Lueken, director of fiscal policy and analysis at the EdChoice Foundation, and I decided to calculate how much ESAs could help a financially troubled blue state, where the longstanding alliance of teacher unions and liberal politicians has created per pupil costs that are three, four, and even five times what is needed to independently educate. Our goal was to see how much the taxpayers of Illinois, New Jersey, Kentucky, California, or Connecticut might benefit if just a small percentage of public school families were funded to take charge of their own children’s schooling…
That’s according to Crooked, a news and opinion website run by several high-profile former staffers from President Barack Obama’s administration, among others. On Thursday, the site posted what it characterized as a Trump White House “wish list” for several policy areas.
Included on that list, which isn’t dated, is “1 billion dollars to create an education savings account for military families living on bases.” There’s also an item for “a state opt-in funding stream that allows…
Two studies published by Education Next (EdNext) … conclude that parents seem to be happier with their children’s schools when they are able to choose them.
The first study was an analysis of data from the 2012 National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) survey, which was given to a representative sample of 17,166 households. In the survey, the US Department of Education asked parents about their satisfaction with their child’s school. While the data was collected in 2012, it had never been published until the EdNext analysis.
The data showed that the percentage of parents who were “very satisfied” with their children’s schools was higher for parents with students in schools of choice—including charter schools (63 percent), district schools of choice (61 percent), and private schools (81 percent)—than for parents with students assigned to a specific district school (56 percent).
The second study reported on the results of a first-of-its-kind parent satisfaction poll that EdNext conducted last summer, with a representative sample of 1,500 parents. Across all surveyed categories, except “location of school”, the data showed that more chartered school parents were “very satisfied” or “satisfied” than district parents. Similarly, private school parents were more satisfied across all categories than district parents.
The two studies support the hypothesis posed that, “to maintain and enlarge their market share, all schools of choice must satisfy the families who make use of them.” And the consistency between the two is important, according to Paul Peterson, an author on both studies, because “even though [the two surveys] had somewhat different methodologies our findings are surprisingly consistent.”
The findings of these two studies are also consistent with overall national American attitudes towards choice and chartering. Last year’s PDK/Gallup Poll showed nearly two-thirds of Americans are in favor of charter schools, and of permitting parents to select any public school in their district.
Probably not, say a couple dozen inside-the-beltway education experts surveyed by Whiteboard Advisors. In fact 79 percent of them don’t think Congress will follow through on the proposals.
Here’s a handy graphic breaking this down:
Most of those surveyed expected to see Title II, a $2.05 billion program aimed at improving teacher quality, stick around too, although it might be reduced…
U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos wants teachers and school leaders to move past the blackboards-and-desks model of schooling, with an eye towards better serving individual kids.
In DeVos’ view, schools have looked pretty much the same over the past five decades or so.
“For far too many kids, this year’s first day back to school looks and feels a lot like last year’s first day back to school. And the year before that. And the generation before that. And the generation before that! That means your parent’s parent’s parents!” she told students at Woods Learning Center in Casper, Wyo., according to prepared remarks. “Most students are starting a new school year that is all too familiar. … They follow the same schedule, the same routine–just waiting to be saved by the bell.”
That’s not helping keep kids engaged, she added: “It’s a mundane malaise that dampens dreams, dims horizons, and denies futures.”
The speech kicked off a six-state tour to highlight what it means to “rethink” education, during which DeVos gave shout-outs to former President Ronald Reagan, Albert Einstein, and Steve Jobs. But she didn’t offer a ton of new specifics about how her department would help with that reinvention, beyond shining a spotlight on schools that she thinks are on the right track. And one of the more than thirty protestors outside urged her to “Rethink Vouchers” according to the Casper Star Tribune.
In her speech, without naming names, DeVos continued to do rhetorical battle with people who she says want to keep K-12 schools stuck in the past.
“Today, there is a whole industry of naysayers who loudly defend something they like to call the education ‘system.'” she said. “What’s an education ‘system’? There is no such thing! Are you a system? No, you’re individual students, parents and teachers.”
She said some schools have been able to move past the old model.
Woods Learning Center in Wyoming’s Natrona County, where DeVos kicked off her tour, is a “teacher-powered” school, with no principal. Its students don’t get traditional letter grades. And kids can enroll in Woods through the district’s open enrollment policy.
“Students, your parents know you best, and they are in the best position to select the best learning environment for you,” DeVos told the children.
She also likes that Woods emphasizes “personalized instruction” for each student.
“Your personalized learning program rethinks school because it is structured around you. Each of your learning plans is developed for each of you, recognizing that each of you is different, and that you learn at your own pace and in your own way,” DeVos said. “Your success here at Woods is determined by what each of you are learning and mastering. Not by how long you sit at your desks. That is awesome, by the way.”
‘Start Rethinking Schools’
DeVos didn’t delve into details though, about just how her department might help schools begin to rethink instruction, other than, of course, by highlighting what she sees as good examples through the back-to-school tour.
President Donald Trump’s budget proposal would cut two programs that schools might use to remake instruction. It seeks to zero out the main federal program for teacher training and get rid of a new block grant created under the Every Student Succeeds Act that districts can use for technology, which can enable personalized learning programs. But so far, the Trump-DeVos school choice proposals have fallen flat in Congress.
After her speech, DeVos took questions from kids. Unsurprisingly, none of them mentioned the proposed budget cuts, but one student asked how she planned to “rethink schools.”
DeVos said this will ultimately be up to educators, not Washington.
“I’m going to challenge teaching and leaders in school to start rethinking schools, because I don’t have all the answers,” she said. “And the people I work with in Washington don’t have all the answers. But I’ll bet lots of teachers in lots of schools around our country have the answers.”
This week, DeVos will be visiting private, public, and charter schools in Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska. Her next stop in Wyoming is St. Stephen’s Indian High School on the Wind River Reservation.
School choice programs the Trump administration wants in next year’s budget haven’t gotten traction, at least with House lawmakers. (We still don’t know yet how the Senate feels.) But those aren’t the only choice plans Congress has the chance to consider. So how are these doing?
We checked in on the progress of a few, relatively high-profile pieces of legislation on Capitol Hill designed to expand school choice in various ways, and to various degrees. Here’s a status report for each.
H.R. 610,Choice in Education Act: This bill was introduced by Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, in January. It would create vouchers using federal funds. It was introduced in the House education committee in January, but lawmakers haven’t acted on it since…
Written by Mashea Ashton for the Arizona Informant
It’s fair to say the ultimate goal of the education reform movement, and the education community in general, is to ensure that all students – no matter where they live or what their background is – have access to a high-quality education. This is a big and intimidating challenge, an addressing it requires across-the-board commitment to three foundational goals.
First, we have to ensure that low-income families have access to high-quality educational opportunities at local private schools. Too often, those at the lower end of the income spectrum are limited to sub-par or failing public schools simply by virtue of what neighborhood they live in. This is an unacceptable outcome for those of us committed to educational equality, and that’s why we should focus time and resources on ensuring that workable solutions like vouchers and tax credits are an option for our nation’s most disadvantaged students.
Mashea Ashton
Second, we have to be committed to providing access to high-quality public charter schools. As public schools operated independently of their district, charter schools are in a unique position to lead in educational innovation, setting an example for both private and traditional district schools.
But too often they lack the funding and access to facilities that other public schools enjoy. All students deserve equal access to educational funding, facilities, and opportunities in areas where charter schools are available, and we have to work even harder to make sure charter schools are available as an option in those places that don’t currently provide educational opportunity.
Third, we have to work to improve the quality of the traditional public schools we already have. There’s a temptation for education reformers to focus on progress we can make outside district school systems. In many ways it’s easier to enact change through private and public charter schools than it is in district schools. But committing to high-quality education for all students means making sure that every school is providing the best possible education to its students.
It’s easy to embrace an “us versus them” mentality, especially between reformers and the establishment, but even among reformers. Each sector of the reform movement has its own priorities, and when we focus only on our goals we risk losing sight of our purpose. Ultimately, we’ll only realize our shared vision if we learn to work together, both as reformers with different priorities and in collaboration with the establishment.
That’s what we’re trying to do in Newark, New Jersey, where parents, educators, administrators, students, clergy, community leaders and other local stakeholders are coming together for educational opportunity. Despite significant budgetary and community challenges, we have been able to establish significant changes in the educational landscape. Nearly one-third of Newark’s public school students are now served in charter schools, and the entire community is talking about ways to continue expanding access to high-quality options.
I’ve said before, and it bears repeating, that we have to take a kids-first approach to the issue. If charter, private, and district schools can all acknowledge that we have the same universal goal, if we can acknowledge together that our children are more important than politics, ego, or legacy, we can increase access to high-quality options across the board.
Mashea Ashton serves on the board of the Black Alliance for Educational Options, and is the CEO of the Newark Charter School Fund.
Yesterday, a twelve-member task force, convened by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), released a report on “Quality Education.” The task force was formed in December 2016 after the NAACP’s October 2016 call for a national moratorium on expanding charter schools until a set of conditions were met.
The charge of the task force was to bring forward “practical recommendations that respond to the urgency of this resolution and the inequities undermining public education.” In order to fulfill their charge, from December 2016 to April 2017, the task force held public hearings in seven cities—New Haven, Memphis, Orlando, Los Angeles, Detroit, New Orleans, and New York.
The report acknowledged that, from testimonials at the public hearings, they found some positive aspects of charter schools. However, the report ultimately concluded that “even the best charters are not a substitute for more stable, adequate and equitable investments in public education in communities that serve all children.”
Criticism of Public Hearings
According to NAACP task report report, the “hearing format [for the public meetings] ensured testimony” from all of the following stakeholders: educators, administrators, school policy experts, charter school leaders, parents, advocates, students, and community leaders. However, some have questioned the authenticity and fairness of these meetings, claiming that they did not include groups and individuals who were charter supporters.
For example, in Tennessee, members of Memphis Lift, a parent-activist organization, voiced disapproval when they were only allowed 12 minutes at the end of a four-hour meeting. Additionally, in Orlando, Minnesota education activist Rashad Anthony Turner was ushered out of the meeting by police after he interrupted a speech by Randi Weingarten, American Federation of Teachers President, because opponents of the moratorium were kept waiting.
Task Force Provides Five Recommendations Based on Public Hearings
According to the report, the testimonials illuminated the “perceived” benefits and problems with charter schools. Using those testimonials, the task force created five recommendations, summarized below, that would improve the quality of charter schools.
Recommendation #1: Provide more equitable and adequate funding for schools serving students of color. The task force argued that education funding has been “inadequate and unequal for students of color for hundreds of years.” In order to remedy the problem, the task force recommended that states should implement weighted student formula systems and model them after the systems that Massachusetts and California have pursued. They also recommended that the federal government should “fully enforce” the funding equity provisions within the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA).
Recommendation #2: Invest productively in low-performing schools and schools with significant opportunity and achievement gaps. In order to ensure that all students receive a high-quality education, the task force recommends that federal, state, and local policies need to “sufficiently” invest in three things: creating incentives to attract and retain teachers, evolving instruction to be more challenging and inclusive, and providing more wraparound services for students such as health and mental services.
Recommendation #3: Develop and enforce robust charter school accountability measures. There were five parts within this recommendation. They are as follows:
Create and enforce a rigorous chartering authorizing and renewal process. The task force recommends that states should only allow districts to serve as authorizers. This is significant since, of the 44 states that allow charter schools, only four—Wyoming, Virginia, Iowa, and Kansas—have district-only charter authorization.
Create and enforce a common accountability system.
Monitor and require charter schools to admit and retain all students. This recommendation calls for open enrollment procedures, and asserts that charter schools should not be allowed to counsel out, push out, or expel students that they “perceive as academically or behaviorally struggling, or whose parents cannot maintain participation requirements or monetary fees.”
Create and monitor transparent disciplinary guidelines that meet students’ ongoing learning needs and prevent push out. The report recommends that charter schools should be required to follow the “same state regulations regarding discipline as public schools,” and use restorative justice practices.
Require charter schools to hire certified teachers. Many states allow charter schools to hire uncertified teachers at higher rates than traditional public schools, however Minnesota is not one of them.
Recommendation #4: Require fiscal transparency and equity. The task force recommends that all charter schools be held to the “same level of fiscal transparency and scrutiny as other public schools.”
Recommendation #5: Eliminate for-profit charter schools. This recommendation not only states that all for-profit charter schools should be eliminated, but that all for-profit management companies that run nonprofit charter schools should be eliminated as well. Approximately 13 percent of U.S. charter schools are run by for-profit companies. Additionally, at least 15 states allow virtual schools, with many of them operated by for-profit organizations.
Report Elicits Scrutiny from Education Advocates
In response to the NAACP report, Nina Rees, CEO and President of the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools (NAPCS), issued a statement where she indicated that NAPCS was glad to see the NAACP recognize the value of charter schools and agreed with them that “whoever oversees a public school should take that responsibility seriously, have the highest expectations, and hold educators in the school accountable” for educating students.
However, Rees also asserted that the NAACP’s policy resolution and report failed to “acknowledge that Black parents are demanding more and better public-school options,” citing a nationally representative survey which found that found 82 percent of Black parents favored allowing parents to choose their child’s public school.
She also cited a 2015 CREDO Urban Charter Schools Report, which found that Black public charter school students gained 36 days of learning in math and 26 in reading over their non-charter school peers.
Chris Stewart, based in Minnesota and former director of outreach and external affairs for Education Post, asserted that “the NAACP has lost its way,” claiming that they have become an “unwitting tool of teacher unions” due to the union’s significant contributions to the NAACP over the years. He also claimed that the unions are “threatened by the growth and success of non-unionized charter schools.”
District-Charter Collaboration: Hope in a Time of Political Tension
The growing and contentious disagreements between education organizations and advocates regarding the merits of charter versus traditional district schools are not new and will likely continue to dominate the news cycle.
However, in recent years, a growing number of districts and charter schools have put aside their political differences and worked together in order to do what’s best for students. Our next two blog posts will examine the cities where some of those collaborative relationships are taking place, as well as provide history on district-charter collaboration in Minnesota.
The day Ayden came home from school with bruises, his mother started looking for a new school.
Ayden’s a bright 9-year-old with a blond crew cut, glasses and an eager smile showing new teeth coming in. He also has autism, ADHD and a seizure disorder. (We’re not using his last name to protect his privacy.) He loves karate, chapter books and very soft blankets: “I love the fuzziness, I just cocoon myself into my own burrito.”
“He’s so smart but lacks so much socially,” says his mother, Lynn.
She says Ayden was suspended repeatedly from his school in St. Lucie County, Fla., starting in first grade, for outbursts like throwing a chair. And during “meltdowns,” he was physically restrained by being held in a bear hug from behind or penned in with gym-style mats for up to 45 minutes.
“Not just sometimes, it was every single day!” Ayden says. “That kind of stress gets me all worked up and it makes my tics go crazy!”
One day, Lynn says, Ayden came home with marks all over his body from being restrained. “That was my final straw.” She started looking for another school.
School choice advocates seemed surprised earlier this year when the NAACP called for a moratorium on new charter schools. The need for school choice, according to many advocates, such as Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, stems from lack of choices and underperformance of public schools for low-income students and students of color. However, a new survey by the civil rights group The Leadership Conference asks black and Latino parents about their views on education. Instead of education advocates and policymakers presupposing that all parents want is choice, we should stop and listen to them.
Parents want changes that would provide fair opportunities to their students. Most of their criticism is centered around race-based inequalities in funding and resources, as well as biased treatment of their students. Some parents may use school choice to attain greater equality, but until every school provides a high-quality education, providing options alone isn’t enough.
The Leadership Conference surveyed 600 black parents and 600 Latino parents across the U.S., all with children ages 5-18. The margin of error for each group is 4 percent. In addition to ensuring that our education system hears the voices of all groups of parents, this survey is particularly important because it helps peel back the layers on why black and Latino students often lag behind in educational attainment. They also make up nearly half of the student population.
Surveyed parents overwhelmingly felt that schools in black and Latino communities received less funding than schools in white neighborhoods. Research from EdBuild, an organization that studies education funding, would back up that sentiment. Black parents whose children attended majority white schools were more likely to rate their school as excellent than parents of students at majority-black schools (61 versus 14 percent). If funding tends to follow white students, then minority students at majority-white schools would also benefit from better supported schools. Socioeconomic status may also play a role in this perception; black and Latino students are far more likely to attend high-poverty schools than white students.
It’s fair to say the ultimate goal of the education reform movement, and the education community in general, is to ensure that all students – no matter where they live or what their background is – have access to a high-quality education. This is a big and intimidating challenge, an addressing it requires across-the-board commitment to three foundational goals.
School choice advocates seemed surprised earlier this year when the NAACP called for a moratorium on new charter schools. The need for school choice, according to many advocates, such as Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, stems from lack of choices and underperformance of public schools for low-income students and students of color. However, a new survey by the civil rights group The Leadership Conference asks black and Latino parents about their views on education. Instead of education advocates and policymakers presupposing that all parents want is choice, we should stop and listen to them.