The Big Thaw
Washington Unites for Opportunity As Nation Braces for Big Chill
Chilling Results from the Nation’s Report Card?
The Nation’s Report Card is likely to chill the warmest of hearts tomorrow when the results of the 2024 Math and Reading Assessment are released at 12:01 AM Wednesday. The data will reflect scores for 4th graders who were in Kindergarten during Covid, and 8th graders who were in the formative year of 4th grade when Covid broke.
Tomorrow’s results are expected to be no better and will likely be worse for some student groups. Even if there are modest gains, having less than excellence and mastery on any subject is a condemnation on how US schools operate.
Why is this important? NAEP is the gold standard of educational achievement. Whereas every state grades their various student assessments on a curve, setting “cut scores” that allow someone to pass, even if they’ve gotten most of the questions wrong, NAEP does none of that. It scores the answers to expected knowledge at the various levels based on whether it was right or wrong, and not just close.
And unlike most federal education initiatives, NAEP has withstood most of the political, partisan or policy pressures that endure in other issue areas. Its unique governing board is broadly representative of the public and political arenas, helping steward a solid report that everyone from Reagan to Obama has praised.
We’ll know soon what it says, but the most important thing is what we all plan to do about it. One thing is for certain - teetering at less than 40% proficiency for more than two decades - and less than 30% for our least advantaged children - is pathetic.
STOP for a New Era
It was a great evening in DC just about a week ago now, and while we couldn’t host all of our friends (like you!) we gathered who we could to forge ahead and begin the hard work to unite - no matter where we started before the election - to accelerate the pace of education change, to seize on opportunities that may lie ahead.
The room was packed with friends and supporters of real education reform, which is the foundation of achieving sustainable, transformational, outstanding and permissionless education, e.g., the freedom to direct one’s education dollars to the school or venue of choice, with the full and fair funding to which every child, no matter their zip code, is entitled.
Said Pat Brantley, CEO of the nearly 30 year-young Friendship Charter Schools in Washington, DC:
“I am honored to be in a room where what binds us together is caring about kids. Do you know why we are in this room together? Because we understand one thing. If we do not put the right education program in front of our kids, we are never making America great.
Hats off not only to those who understand the ties that bind us, but who represent the many options afforded by not only charters but by catholic schools, during this Catholic School Week, as those tired and true institutions never disappoint!
The Olive Branch
The appointment of former TN Education Commissioner Penny Schwinn as Deputy Secretary for Education seems to have thawed the hearts of some anti- and never-Trump forces in the ed reform movement.
The typically Trump-averse Fordham Institute said her appointment “augurs well for a new administration that is being pulled in different directions on education policy.”
AEI Senior Fellow Robert Pondiscio cheered her appointment, saying she was one of the most capabable [state] chiefs he knows.
Some pro-Trump parent groups were not so happy, saying she was pro-masking kids and didn’t fight enough bad stuff in schools.
That the President made such a great appointment wasn’t a surprise in my book. As I commented, “barometer of success is not commitment alone, but whether they have made the tough decisions to challenge vested interests and disrupt the status quo,” and Penny has indeed done that.
The bottom line is no one person will dictate or block any federal proposals - the key, as I’ve written is to have a plumber in every major office ensuring that the pipes are cleaned out:
“The President’s new team needs to work hard to uncover the dozens of other such federal constraints and barriers to student achievement.
“That will take people willing to buck the system, and who knows how to call on the nation’s education innovators who can demonstrate the folly of these rules up close and personal.”
The All Important First Steps
Do we have an Executive Order for you! It’s simple and straightforward:
It is to end discrimination against students with special needs as well as parents making choices outside of predefined public schools in Federal law.
To that end, we, a cadre of education leaders and innovators, are calling on the President to issue a simple order to the US Department of Education to:
“Direct that all Local Education Agencies (LEAs) distribute an equal share of federal funding to schools serving students with special needs but that operate outside of the traditional public school system as provided for by state law, particularly schools serving neurodivergent students and students with special needs as defined by state law; and
“Ensure that federal funds do not discriminate against the choices of parents to send their students to schools that are not part of the public school system, including ordering that states ensure commensurate funding follow students to whichever school is chosen by their parents, if so sanctioned by state law.”
And more! Follow @edreform on X to read more.
As I close, I’m listening and watching the news about federal funds cut off and turned back on. There are lots of arguments to make pro- and con-, but the sky is falling education speak is a bit much considering that federal funds for this and most of next year is already in district coffers so no child, teacher, or school would have been immediately effected. Just saying.
Looking forward to fighting with you on the things that matter most! - Jeanne
Are they Learning?
If you want to know about school it is best to ask those who are the subjects of it. From the ones whom I have spoken with they cannot understand parents repeatedly lecturing our School Board about library books, changing rooms, pronouns and unisex bathrooms when the nations assessment of our schools called out in the national news (which they do know what is in it as relevant to them) is and has been for 20++ years failing to prepare them for the world they hope to prosper in. As a generation of students is lost what idiot self-justifying parent is going to console their adult child over them not being prepared for success because of what books were in the library? We need to get a grip on reality.
Students are completely disengaged because no one cares what they think. Today there is legislation being proposed to ban the most technologically advanced educational resource tool known to humankind, the cell phone. This is because teachers have no idea how to implement that technology into their Lesson Plan (and it overloads the school's bandwidth capacity as students seek better instructional content via WIFI on a YouTube presentation). Of course it is a distraction, but that is only because our methods of education are no where close to being intrinsically engaging for students. They are designed not to take the best advantage of the power of one's innate desire to learn found in every student but to make the teacher's job the easiest and provide after the fact grading metrics to quantify that data which only serves the bean counters, not the student. Our educational methods have shown no outcome based improvement since 1969 when assessing such metrics began.
In closing I have to ask, what job requires one to be in a cubicle for 45 minutes when a bell rings and they are forced to stop what they are doing no matter what the stage of completion and move to the next cubicle over and over throughout their work day with some of those periods requiring the use of a computer and as they move down the line others ban that use and require only using a #2 pencil and their memory. Besides education being mandatory, students show up for school for only two reasons: 1) To hang out with their friends and 2) To feel successful. As far as cell phones, that is just note passing in the 21st century. Feeling successful? Well just ask that question of any student who trusts you with a question they feel you are actually concerned and care about.