To: LWVO
From: Joan Platz
Education Update for June 19, 2006
1) OBM Reports Ohio Budget On Target for FY06:
The June 10, 2006 "Economic Summary" for Ohio, published by the Ohio
Office of Budget and Management, Tim Keen director, reports that total state receipts
and expenditures are on target for a balanced budget by the end of this fiscal
year on June 30, 2006. Currently year-to-date state receipts exceed estimates
by $372.2 million, and year-to-date General Revenue Fund (GRF) disbursements remain
under estimate by $558.8 million.
According to the June "Economic Summary", which is based on May data, state receipts
were $416.3 million over estimates, and expenditures exceeded estimates by $62.5
million, or 3.1 percent in May. GRF tax revenue of $2.533 billion exceeded
estimates by $358 million in May. The personal income tax, the corporate franchise
tax, and the tobacco tax posted higher than estimated receipts, but the sales
tax came in below estimate. The newly implemented Commercial Activity Tax
(CAT) (HB66) has raised $182 million, which is 26.8 percent above estimate for
the year-to-date.
On the expenditure side, year-to-date disbursements are under estimates for almost
all categories except higher education, TANF, and Justice.
The June "Economic Summary" is available at http://www.obm.ohio.gov/finrep/monthly/061006mfr.pdf
2) News from the 109th Congress:
*President Bush signed into law on June 15, 2006 HR 4939, the fiscal year 2006
Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act for Defense, the Global War on Terror,
and Hurricane Recovery. This appropriation totals $94.5 billion and includes
$285 million for schools serving hurricane displaced K-12 students, and $50 million
in grants to institutions of higher education. Lawmakers also included a
$873 billion cap on discretionary spending for FY 07. This amount is now
the target for appropriations committees in the U.S. Senate and House to meet
as they adopt FY07 appropriations.
*Work on FY07 appropriations is underway in the U.S. House and Senate. The
House Appropriations Committee, chaired by Representative Lewis, approved on June
13, 2006 FY07 appropriations of $141.930 billion for the departments of Labor,
Health and Human Services (HHS), and Education. This represents an increase
in discretionary spending of less than 1 percent over FY06 levels. Funding for
the U.S. Department of Education would actually decrease by $401 million.
The proposed appropriations also include funding for several programs eliminated
by President Bush in his FY07 budget proposal such as Even Start, the National
Writing Project, We the People, Vocational and Technical Education, Gear Up, Teacher
Quality Enhancement, and other programs. Funding is eliminated for Parent
Information and Resource Centers, Javits Gifted and Talented, Arts in Education,
Educational Technology State Grants, Teacher Quality Enhancement Grants, and other
programs. The full House must now consider this recommendation.
*The U.S. House Education & the Workforce Committee, chaired by Representative
Buck McKeon, held on June 13, 2006 a second hearing on the reauthorization of
the No Child Left Behind Act. The topics presented at this hearing included raising
achievement among minority and disadvantaged students, disaggregating data to
determine student progress, and calculating Adequate Yearly Progress. Testifying
before the committee were Ray Simon, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Education; Dr. Ronald
Peiffer, Deputy Superintendent for the Maryland State Department of Education;
Dr. Cynthia Kuhlman, Principal of Centennial Place Elementary School in Atlanta,
GA; and Mr. John C. Brittain, Chief Counsel and Deputy Director, Lawyers Committee
for Civil Rights Under Law, Washington, DC.
According to testimony presented by Ray Simon, the U.S. Department of Education,
in response to a number of media questions regarding the determination of subgroups,
will hold a technical assistance conference later this year to help states evaluate
their accountability systems to ensure that the maximum number of students are
counted in the Adequate Yearly Progress calculation.
The Committee will announce additional hearings on the reauthorization of the
No Child Left Behind Act over the next few months. To comment on the No
Child Left Behind Act, please contact the Commission on No Child Left Behind at
http://www.aspeninstitute.org/NCLB.
3) State Board of Education Retreat:
The State Board of Education, Sue Westendorf president, held a retreat on June
11-13, 2006 at Salt Fork State Park Lodge near Cambridge, Ohio. The board
reviewed the progress made in achieving the 2005-2006 State Board Approved Priorities
(BAPs); revised those priorities for 2006-2007; and defined the work and structure
of the 2006-2007 State Board of Education. During a brief business meeting
the board adopted a resolution commending Superintendent of Public Instruction,
Dr. Susan Tave Zelman, for "making excellent progress toward the goals set forth
in the strategic plan and the priorities approved by the State Board of Education,"
expressed confidence in her as Ohio's Superintendent of Public Instruction, and
approved a four-percent salary increase for her, effective July 1, 2006.
The board will continue to discuss the BAPs for 2006-07 during their July 2006
meeting, which is scheduled for Monday and Tuesday, July 10-11, 2006 at the Ohio
School for the Deaf, 500 Morse Road, Columbus, Ohio.
4) Ohio Partnership for Continued Learning:
The Ohio Partnership for Continued Learning, chaired by Governor Bob Taft, met
on June 14, 2006 in Columbus to update members on several initiatives including
the High School Model Programs (Ohio Department of Education) and the American
Diploma Project (Achieve), the Ohio Core legislative initiatives - SB 311 (Gardner)
and HB 565 (Setzer), and recommendations for revising the Post Secondary Enrollment
Options Program. The Partnership was launched in 2005 by Governor Taft and
leaders in the education and business communities to find better ways to prepare
Ohio students for success in the 21st Century global economy, by creating a seamless
preK-16 education system. The members of the Partnership include Governor
Bob Taft and representatives from the Governor's Office, the Ohio General Assembly,
the State Board of Education, the Ohio Board of Regents, educators, and the business
community in Ohio. The Partnership has scheduled meetings for September
20, 2006 and November 15, 2006. The Post Secondary Enrollment Options Subcommittee
is scheduled to meet again on July 12, 2006 and August 9, 2006. All meetings
are held in the Vern Riffe Center, 31st Floor, 77 South High Street, Columbus.
5) Another Study on the Impact of the No Child Left Behind Act:
Researchers at the Harvard Civil Rights Project released on June 15, 2006 a new
study on the progress of the No Child Left Behind Act to eliminate achievement
gaps among groups of students. The study is called "Tracking Achievement
Gaps and Assessing the Impact of the NCLB on the Gaps: An In-depth Look
into National and State Reading and Math Outcome Trends". The report was
written by Jaekyung Lee, a professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo,
and includes a Foreward by Gary Orfield, director of the Harvard Civil Rights
Project.
The study shows that the federal NCLB "...hasn't improved reading and mathematical
achievement or reduced achievement gaps. The study also
revealed that the NCLB won't meet its goals of 100 percent student proficiency
by 2014 if the trends of the first several years continue."
According to the summary of the report,
"This study offers systematic trend analyses of NAEP national and state-level
public school fourth and eighth graders' reading and math achievement results
during pre-NCLB (1990-2001) and post-NCLB (2002-2005) periods. It compares post-NCLB
trends in reading and math achievement with pre-NCLB trends among different racial
and
socioeconomic groups of fourth and eighth graders from across the nation and states."
"National and state progress toward closing racial and socioeconomic achievement
gaps are evaluated not only in terms of their success in reducing the test score
gaps but also in terms of reducing each subgroup's chance of failing to meet desired
performance standards. Further, it provides new evidence on the impact of state
accountability policy on the achievement gap trends and the discrepancies between
NAEP and state assessment results."
The following are the key findings of the report, taken from the summary:
"Key Findings
* NCLB did not have a significant impact on improving reading and math achievement
across the nation and states. Based on the NAEP results, the national average
achievement remains flat in reading and grows at the same pace in math after NCLB
than before. In grade 4 math, there was a temporary improvement right after NCLB,
but it was followed by a return to the pre-reform growth rate.
Consequently, continuation of the current trend will leave the nation far behind
the NCLB target of 100 percent proficiency by 2014. Only 24 to 34 percent of students
will meet the NAEP proficiency target in reading and 29 to 64 percent meeting
that math proficiency target by 2014.
* NCLB has not helped the nation and states significantly narrow the achievement
gap. The racial and socioeconomic achievement gap in the NAEP reading and math
achievement persists after NCLB. Despite some improvement in reducing the gap
in math right after NCLB, the progress was not sustained. If the current trend
continues, the proficiency gap between advantaged White and disadvantaged minority
students will hardly close by 2014. The study predicts that by 2014, less than
25 percent of Poor and Black students will achieve NAEP proficiency in reading,
and less than 50 percent will achieve proficiency in math.
* NCLB's attempt to scale up the alleged success of states that adopted test-driven
accountability policy prior to NCLB, so-called first generation accountability
states (e.g., Florida, North Carolina, Texas) did not work. It neither enhanced
the first generation states' earlier academic improvement nor transferred the
effects of a test-driven accountability system to states that adopted test-based
accountability under NCLB, the second generation accountability states. Moreover,
both first and second generation states failed to narrow NAEP reading and math
achievement gaps after NCLB.
* NCLB's reliance on state assessment as the basis of school accountability is
misleading since state-administered tests tend to significantly inflate proficiency
levels and proficiency gains as well as deflate racial and social achievement
gaps in the states. The higher the stakes of state assessments, the greater the
discrepancies between NAEP and state assessment results. These discrepancies were
particularly large for Poor, Black and Hispanic students."
Gary Orfield, director of the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University, authored
a Foreward that includes the following observations about the law and the impact
of these findings on its reauthorization:
*Changes in NAEP scores must be compared to the trends that existed for years
before NCLB became law to show any real improvement in student achievement as
a result of NCLB.
*The theory and policy behind NCLB may need to be modified. "The best research
suggests that school reform takes time, that investments must be made in curriculum
and instruction, and that sustaining educational improvement in high poverty schools
is difficult at best. It is much easier to attract and hold teachers in
schools where they are needed by rewards when they make a difference than with
constant threats."
*The longer-term results of NCLB may be less disappointing than those in the first
several years of the project. Even then the gains would need to be compared
to the costs of the program to determine whether or not the results were worth
the costs.
* "Congress should be open to other ideas and should listen to educators who have
actually accomplished major breakthroughs and to researchers outside the Washington
advocacy networks who have actually documented what kinds of reforms can work,
how much they can accomplish, what is a reasonable theory of change, and what
kind of time and resources are needed to realize its potential."
The full report is available at the following web site: http://www.civilrightsproject.harvard.edu/research/esea/nclb_naep_lee.pdf
6) Other Ways to Close the Achievement Gap:
The recent issue of WestEd Policy Perspectives, "Reforms That Could Help
Narrow the Achievement Gap", is an excerpt from a book written in 2004 by Richard
Rothstein called "Class and Schools: Using Social, Economic, and Educational
Reform to Close the Black-White Achievement Gap." Mr. Rothstein is a Research
Associate at the Economic Policy Institute.
In this excerpt Mr. Rothstein opines that it is wrong to focus exclusively on
school policies to improve student achievement. "Without complementary investments
in early childhood preparation, health care, housing, after-school and summer
programs, and other social and economic supports, the achievement gap will never
be closed."
In addition to improving obvious school policies, the following "other" reform
efforts are needed to help schools narrow the achievement gap among students:
Greater Income Equality; Stable, Adequate, Housing; School-Community Clinics;
Early Childhood Education; After-School Programs; and Summer Programs.
The WestEd Policy Perspective is available online at http://www.wested.org/cs/we/view/rs/819
7) Bills Introduced the Week of June 12, 2006:
SB344 (Fedor) - Community Schools: Clarifies that community schools are subject
to public audit and requires the Auditor of State to conduct regular audits of
community school sponsors and operators.
SB345 (Fedor) - Student Achievement: Creates task forces in each city, exempted
village, and local school district to develop strategies to close achievement
gaps.
SB346 (Fedor) -School/Parent Compacts: Requires the board of education of
each school district to offer a school-parent compact.