NEPC Press Releases

Weighing in on California School Finance Reform

elaine — Tue, 18 Jun 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Review of Weighted School Funding in California

Recent Brief’s Argument for ‘Weighted Funding’ is Lacking in Evidentiary Support

Contact:
William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net  
Bruce Baker, (732) 932-7496, x8232, bruce.baker@gse.rutgers.edu

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/lnzdeta

BOULDER, CO (June 18, 2013) – The Reason Foundation’s recent brief on California Gov. Jerry Brown’s school finance reform plan endorses Brown’s proposal and then uses it to advance additional preferences for reducing the role of school districts and for giving school principals greater autonomy over spending. Yet according to a new review, neither the endorsement of Brown’s plan, nor the call for revising it, are grounded in any data or sufficiently supported by existing research.

The report was reviewed for the Think Twice think tank review project by Bruce Baker, a school finance expert at Rutgers University. The review is published today by the National Education Policy Center, housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education.

Weighted Student Funding for California, by Lisa Snell of the Reason Foundation, praises Brown’s school finance reform plan, which would replace the state’s current school funding system of restricted categorical grants with a system that uses cost adjustment factors tied primarily to students’ income and English learner status.

The Reason report also advocates modifying Brown’s proposal, to link the state funds to individual children, so that “money follows the child” regardless of which school he or she is enrolled in. Among other things, this removes spending discretion from school districts and grants a great deal more autonomy to school principals.

The report argues that revising the Brown plan in accord with Reason’s recommendations has the potential to more equitably distribute funding across local public school districts. “Yet no data are presented or evaluated to support these claims,” according to Baker, and the report provides little to support its assertions that such a system is more equitable, more efficient, or more transparent.

“The report instead offers a highly filtered summary of existing literature on the efficacy of weighted student funding for improving educational equity or school quality,” Baker writes. “While many would concur that California’s funding system is in disrepair, the Reason report offers little precise or valuable guidance for policymakers.”

Find Bruce Baker’s review on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/thinktank/review-weighted-student-funding-calif

Find Weighted Student Funding for California, by Lisa Snell, on the web at:
http://reason.org/news/show/weighted-student-funding-for-califo

The Think Twice think tank review project (http://thinktankreview.org) of the National Education Policy Center (NEPC) provides the public, policymakers, and the press with timely, academically sound reviews of selected publications. NEPC is housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education. The Think Twice think tank review project is made possible in part by support provided by the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice.

The mission of the National Education Policy Center is to produce and disseminate high-quality, peer-reviewed research to inform education policy discussions. We are guided by the belief that the democratic governance of public education is strengthened when policies are based on sound evidence. For more information on the NEPC, please visit http://nepc.colorado.edu/.

This brief is also found on the GLC website at http://www.greatlakescenter.org/.

Forward-Looking Alternatives on Critical Education Issues

elaine — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking

NEPC Series Offers Research-Based Options for Policymakers

Contact:
William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net
Jamie Horwitz, 202-549-4921, jhdcpr@starpower.net
Amy Shenker, 301-412-2616, askpr2011@gmail.com

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/lgzndgl

Boulder, CO (June 13, 2013) – At a time of growing national recognition of the need for a policy shift to more successful approaches to school reform, the National Education Policy Center (NEPC) at the University of Colorado Boulder has published a series of ten policy briefs identifying affirmative, research-based options for reform in areas including teacher evaluation, early childhood education, and school choice.

“The task of reforming reform – of restoring balance and reason to education policies – certainly begins with a broad public awareness that our politicians have made some poor choices over the past couple decades, and we’ve certainly reached that point in the US,” said CU Boulder Professor Kevin Welner, NEPC’s Director. “But the next step is to turn to evidence about research-based best practices.”

The series of briefs, entitled Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking, addresses ten important policy areas and effective reform strategies. Along with the recently published book from Oxford University Press, “Closing the Opportunity Gap: What America Must Do to Give Every Child an Even Chance,” this series sets forth a forward-looking alternative to the current over-reliance on test-based accountability, privatization and school choice.

“We encourage policymakers to use these research-based strategies to help strengthen our education system,” said Dr. William Mathis, NEPC’s Managing Director and the author of the series. “The strategies are carefully grounded in the overall evidence base about policies and practices that truly benefit the nation’s children.”

The briefs cover the following topics:

Teacher Evaluation. A sound evaluation system provides teachers and their supervisors with timely, detailed and constructive feedback that is then used to identify areas of weakness and strength. The current push to place students’ test scores at the center of such a system is destructive on many levels, including poisonous incentives to narrow curriculum and teach to the test. Researchers advocate balancing performance measures with observational approaches that directly focus on developing and improving teaching.

Common Core State Standards. While standards can provide a framework for curriculum and instruction and would help policymakers recognize the need for supports for teaching and learning, standards alone do little to change what happens in the classroom. If the move toward Common Core standards is just one more element of a test-based accountability system, it will likely do more harm than good. For the effort to truly benefit students, it will have to be accompanied by a political will to provide schools and students the professional support and learning resources necessary to increase opportunities to learn.

Preschool Education. When at-risk children are provided with at least two years of high-quality early childhood education, this additional support can close as much as half the achievement gap and is associated with a wide range of positive adult outcomes, including higher graduation rates, higher college attendance and higher employment. Yet overall preschool funding per child served is, in inflation-adjusted dollars, lower than a decade ago. An extended preschool day and year with universal access to enrollment and strong quality controls could make a huge difference for the nation’s children.

Public Funding of School Choice. Pursuing school choice in an unconstrained way, as part of market-driven reform, has proven to be harmful – in terms of segregation and stratification as well as quality and financial abuse. But choice policies carry the potential to diversify options, stimulate innovation, and even to reduce segregation. The key is for school choice to be approached, designed, and implemented as a tool for accomplishing important policy objectives, rather than as an objective unto itself.

Dropout Strategies. This brief offers several research-based recommendations to address dropout concerns: academic support and enrichment for at-risk students, adult advocates for at-risk students, personalized and supportive learning environments, and instruction that is relevant to the student’s post-high-school options. The NEPC document emphasizes that the majority of dropout risk factors are centered outside the school, and urges strong coordination between schools, and social and health agencies.

Effective School Expenditures. When increased spending is grounded in evidence of effectiveness, it will lead to positive outcomes. For example, money should be wisely and carefully directed to the following approaches: enriched learning opportunities after school and over the summer, increased availability of high-quality early education and full-day kindergarten, reductions of class size, and increased funding and program support for economically disadvantaged children and English language learners.

English Language Learners and Parent Involvement. The enrollment of English language learners (ELLs) in U.S. schools – most of whom are native born – has more than doubled over the last two decades. Opportunities to learn for these children will be enhanced by policies that help foster educationally supportive parenting skills, establish two-way communications, recruit families as volunteers and audiences, involve families with homework, include families in school governance, and collaborate with community organizations.

21st Century Skills and Implications for Education. The idea of “21^st Century Skills” has been used to mean very different things. This brief supports efforts to blend two kinds of learning – the so-called soft skills of teamwork, critical thinking, problem-solving, communication skills and diversity awareness, and the so-called cognitive skills in science, technology, math and reading. Approaches such as “Linked Learning” prevent the narrowing of curriculum and promotes the expansion of authentic learning opportunities.

Addressing School Environment and Safety for LGBT Students. Schools must create healthy, welcoming environments conducive to learning for all students. Yet a 2011 survey found that more than four out of five LGBT students reported being verbally harassed, more than one in three reported physical harassment, and nearly one in five reported being physically assaulted. Through thoughtful, deliberate efforts directed toward students, teachers and others, schools can shape much healthier environments.

Moving Beyond Tracking. Rather than achieving its supposed goal – to tailor instruction to the diverse needs of students – tracking students by their perceived ability has been found to be harmful to those enrolled in lower tracks and to provide no significant advantages for higher-tracked students. The brief explains the research base supporting universal acceleration in untracked classrooms. When high-quality, enriched curriculum is provided to all students, the effect is to benefit both high-achieving and low-achieving students.

Find Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/options. The website also links to NEPC’s reports and research on other education topics.

This research brief is made possible in part by the support of the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice (GLC). For more information about GLC, visit http://www.greatlakescenter.org/.

Did ‘America Achieves’ Make Its Case for Another Test?

elaine — Tue, 04 Jun 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Review of Middle Class or Middle of the Pack

Contact:

William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net
Martin Carnoy, (650) 856-7722, carnoy@stanford.edu

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/k8mkqez

BOULDER, CO (June 4, 2013) – According to a recent report, U.S. high schools should start taking part in yet another standardized test, as a way to spur improvements in achievement. Specifically, the report contends that participating in a new international test will benefit U.S. middle class students.

The report, from the advocacy organization America Achieves, is titled Middle Class or Middle of the Pack: What can we learn when benchmarking U.S. schools against the world’s best?. It contends that U.S. students are performing inadequately in the math and science portions of a prominent international assessment called the Program of International Student Assessment (PISA), run by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The authors of the report consider the PISA results a “wake-up call to America’s middle class.” They contend that in response U.S. high schools should start taking part in a new international test, based on the PISA and also run by the OECD, that will compare the academic knowledge and skills of 15-year-olds around the world.

But a review of the report released today finds no evidence to support the report’s arguments. Martin Carnoy of Stanford University reviewed the report for the Think Twice think tank review project and is published today by the National Education Policy Center, housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education.

Carnoy points out that with its report, America Achieves promotes the idea that individual school participation in such international tests offers a valid means of improving school effectiveness and the effectives of national education systems. Yet he notes that the report itself fails to support this claim, and the claim is also not supported by PISA reports or the broader literature on school improvement and educational reform.

The America Achieves report “is not grounded in research but rather is an assertion that measurement, by itself, is an effective reform tool.” And it makes that assertion without ever explaining how the test in question would be linked to curricula or strategies tailored to teaching mathematics and science, or to specific teacher professional development strategies.

“Thus the report is of no utility to policymakers,” Carnoy concludes.

Find Martin Carnoy’s review on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/thinktank/review-middle-class-or-middle-of-pack.

Find Middle Class or Middle of the Pack: What can we learn when benchmarking U.S. schools against the world’s best?, published by America Achieves, on the web at:
http://www.americaachieves.org/docs/OECD/Middle-Class-Or-Middle-Of-Pack2.pdf.

The Think Twice think tank review project (http://thinktankreview.org) of the National Education Policy Center (NEPC) provides the public, policy makers, and the press with timely, academically sound reviews of selected publications. NEPC is housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education. The Think Twice think tank review project is made possible in part by support provided by the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice.

The mission of the National Education Policy Center is to produce and disseminate high-quality, peer-reviewed research to inform education policy discussions. We are guided by the belief that the democratic governance of public education is strengthened when policies are based on sound evidence. For more information on the NEPC, please visit http://nepc.colorado.edu/.

This review is also found on the GLC website at http://www.greatlakescenter.org/

Research Overwhelmingly Counsels an End to Tracking

elaine — Thu, 30 May 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking

Brief Reiterates Harm from “Ability Grouping” in School,
Prescribes Pathway to Access for All Students

Contact:
William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/qa6cof3

BOULDER, CO (May 30, 2013) –The final installment in a series of short briefs summarizing current relevant findings in education policy research reviews the evidence about “tracking” students – that is, enrolling students in particular classes, curricula and courses of study based on perceived ability.

Rather than achieving its purported goal – to tailor instruction to the diverse needs of students – tracking has, over decades of extensive research, been repeatedly found to be harmful to students enrolled in lower tracks and to provide no significant advantages for higher-tracked students, writes Dr. William Mathis, the author of the series. Mathis is managing director of the National Education Policy Center, housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education.

Mathis also points to the overwhelming research finding that tracking stratifies students by race and by parental wealth. What this means, he explains, is that tracking is one of the primary mistakes that schools make if they hope to close achievement gaps. Children with the most limited opportunities to learn outside of school are then given lesser opportunities within the school.

“Whether known as sorting, streaming or ability grouping, an expansive body of literature conclusively shows tracking is harmful and inequitable and remains an unsupportable practice,” Mathis says.

Summing up the research, Mathis writes that lower-track classes “tend to have watered-down curriculum, less-experienced teachers, lowered expectations, more discipline problems, and less- engaging lessons.” But, he continues, it doesn’t have to be this way: “When high-quality, enriched curriculum is provided to all students, the effect is to benefit both high-achieving and low-achieving students.”

Successful examples of non-tracked or heterogeneous grouping can be found in school within and outside the U.S. Mathis describes research showing that the younger the age at which tracking occurs, the greater the differences among a country’s students on the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) by age 15. And tracking is not associated with higher overall PISA performance.

Yet despite the evidence of its harm, tracking is still pervasive. Attempts to eliminate the practice often meet stiff resistance from teachers and parents who believe they or their children have benefited from a tracked system.

“The teachers assigned to high-track classes tend to be more experienced and therefore can exercise more power,” Mathis writes. “The parents who are able to secure high-track placement for their children are disproportionately likely to be white, well-educated and politically vocal and therefore similarly able to pressure schools to keep higher-track classes for their children,” segregated from lower-income students, students of color, or both.

Mathis concludes with a series of recommendations drawn from an NEPC brief authored by Carol Burris, Kevin Welner, and Jennifer Bezoza, calling for the elimination of curricular tracking that separates students by race, socio-economic status, or assumptions about their learning ability.

The detracking reform described in the earlier NEPC brief is a multi-step process. For instance, it calls upon states to require schools and districts to identify and describe their tracks and placement policies. It also calls upon states as well as non-governmental groups to connect educators and communities with researchers able to advance best practices in serving diverse populations. (The earlier brief, with a comprehensive set of recommendations for moving to a non-stratified school environment, is found at http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/universal-access.)

The new brief by William Mathis is part of Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking, a multipart brief that takes up a number of important policy issues and identifies policies supported by research. Each section focuses on a different issue, and its recommendations to policymakers are based on the latest scholarship.

The brief is made possible in part by support provided by the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice.

Find William Mathis’s brief on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/options

This brief is also found on the GLC website at http://www.greatlakescenter.org/

Safe at School

elaine — Thu, 23 May 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking

New Brief Airs Policies for Full Inclusion of LGBT Students

Contact:
William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/lrtm2sv

BOULDER, CO (May 23, 2013) –The ninth in a series of short briefs summarizing current relevant findings in education policy research discusses the continuing need to ensure schools are safe for all students and examines the particular challenges faced by those who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgendered (LGBT).

The paper is written by Dr. William Mathis, managing director of the National Education Policy Center, housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education.

Mathis notes that LGBT youth “are disproportionately at risk of an unsafe and unhealthy school environment.” A 2011 survey found more than 4 out of 5 LGBT students reported being verbally harassed, more than 1 in 3 reported physical harassment, and nearly 1 in 5 reported being physically assaulted – yet nearly two-thirds of these students never reported the incidents to school authorities, in some cases because they feared that would exacerbate the harassment they experienced. Consequences range from much higher rates of school absence and greater risk for dropping out to higher rates of homelessness and suicide for LGBT youth.

The lives of LGBT students have actually improved substantially over the last decade and a half, coinciding with changes in public opinion to become more supportive of LGBT persons as well as increasingly supportive school policies. Nonetheless, “the problems facing these youths in the nation’s schools are still substantial,” Mathis writes.

Schools have an obligation to ensure a safe and supportive learning environment for all students, including LGBT students. This is a well-established legal principle that is rooted in both the U.S. Constitution and federal statutes guaranteeing equal access to education. Improved state level legislation would further advance society’s basic goal of confirming that schools “provide healthy learning environments for all students.”

The policy brief concludes with a summary of steps schools and educators can take in pursuit of the goal of fully including LGBT students, incorporating professional development, crafting and carrying out school disciplinary policies, and reaching out to LGBT educators as resources in helping to bring about changes in school climate. The brief also points to model legislation, published previously by NEPC, to further effect a more inclusive public education system.

The brief is part of Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking, a multipart brief that takes up a number of important policy issues and identifies policies supported by research. Each section focuses on a different issue, and its recommendations to policymakers are based on the latest scholarship.

The brief is made possible in part by support provided by the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice.

Find William Mathis’s brief on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/options

This brief is also found on the GLC website at http://www.greatlakescenter.org/

Two Paths to 21st Century Learning

elaine — Tue, 14 May 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Research-Based Options for Education Policymaking

New Brief Examines Debate over the Focus of Schooling

Contact:
William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/ctzew3j

BOULDER, CO (May 14, 2013) –The eighth in a series of short briefs summarizing current relevant findings in education policy research explores the idea of “21^st Century skills.” The brief explains the sometimes-conflicting values and proposals for making schools relevant to meeting the needs of the 21^st Century.

The paper is written by Dr. William Mathis, managing director of the National Education Policy Center, housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education.

Mathis points out that, depending upon who is speaking, the question of what 21^st Century skills can or should entail fall into two very different categories. One perspective points to the increasing importance of so-called soft skills of teamwork, critical thinking, problem-solving, communication skills and diversity awareness – a focus that typically emphasizes constructivist learning. The other perspective focuses on cognitive skills in science, technology, math, and reading. It can be traced back at least as far as the Nation at Risk report 30 years ago and also encompasses No Child Left Behind as well as most policies arising out of the Obama administration.

In truth, both types of skills are almost universally embraced as important, and there are ongoing efforts to advance both perspectives together. Mathis writes about approaches that combine “the three R’s” with “the four C’s (Critical thinking and problem solving, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity and innovation).” But he cautions that, “given our history of testing as well as current obstacles, it seems likely that the four C’s will end up being treated merely as weak add-ons to the three R’s.”

Mathis points in particular notable example of a fused effort in the work of Marisa Saunders, who describes a “multiple pathways” or “linked learning” approach that combines academic and technical learning. Linked learning is designed to make school relevant, collaborative, and creative, keeping a variety of options open to all students. “As contrasted with tracking, all students in a Linked-Learning school are provided with a high-quality education that maintains both college and workforce options,” Mathis writes. Additionally, a broad variety of methods are used to assess student achievement rather than simply relying on traditional standardized tests.

Mathis concludes with a series of recommendations that focus on broadening accountability measures to ensure against the narrowing of curriculum and to promote the expansion of authentic learning opportunities. The recommendations also explain the importance of investing time, energy, and resources needed to expand the skills of teachers who would be teaching in a linked-learning setting.

The brief is made possible in part by support provided by the Great Lakes Center for Education Research and Practice.

Find William Mathis’s brief on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/options

This brief is also found on the GLC website at http://www.greatlakescenter.org/

Flunking Again

elaine — Thu, 09 May 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Review of Report Card on American Education

ALEC ‘Report Card’ Gets ‘A’ for Ideological Fealty,
Fails on Research Quality

Contact:
William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net
Christopher Lubienski, 217-333-4382, club@illinois.edu

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/bnptwat

BOULDER, CO (May 9, 2013) – The recent education “report card” on the states put out by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) claims to rely on “high quality research” but gets a failing grade in a new review.

Professor Christopher Lubienski and doctoral candidate T. Jameson Brewer, both of the University of Illinois, reviewed ALEC’s 18^th Report Card on American Education: Ranking State K-12 Performance, Progress, and Reform for the Think Twice think tank review project. The review is published today by the National Education Policy Center, housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education.

The ALEC “report card” assigns its grades based on states’ policies regarding their support for charter schools, their implementation of school voucher plans, and the permissiveness they display toward homeschooling.

“The authors contend that these grades are based on ‘high quality’ research demonstrating that the policies for which they award high grades will improve education for all students,” Lubienski and Jameson write. Instead, the “report card” draws on the work of advocacy groups and is grounded in ideological tenets, leading the authors to assign high grades to states “with unproven and even disproven market-based policies,” the reviewers add. They point out that the authors’ claims of “a growing body of research” lacks citations; their grading system contradicts testing data that they report; and their data on alternative teacher research is “simply wrong.”

“In fact, the research ALEC highlights is quite shoddy and is unsuitable for supporting its recommendations,” Lubienski and Jameson conclude. “The report’s purpose appears to be more about shifting control of education to private interests than in improving education.”

Find the review by Christopher Lubienski and T. Jameson Brewer on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/thinktank/review-report-card-ALEC-2013

Find Report Card on American Education: Ranking State K-12 Performance, Progress, and Reformby Matthew Ladner and Dave Myslinskion the web at:
http://www.alec.org/publications/report-card-on-american-education/.

This review is also found on the GLC website at http://www.greatlakescenter.org/.

New Article Describes the “Dirty Dozen” Ways Charter Schools Influence Student Enrollment

elaine — Mon, 06 May 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Contact:

William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net
Kevin G. Welner, (303) 492-8370, welner@colorado.edu

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/c8kp7f8

BOULDER, CO (May 6, 2013) – Charter schools may be public, but they can shape their student enrollment in surprising ways. This is done though a dozen different practices that often decrease the likelihood of students enrolling with a disfavored set of characteristics, such as students with special needs, those with low test scores, English learners, or students in poverty.

“The Dirty Dozen: How Charter Schools Influence Student Enrollment,” by Kevin Welner, Professor of education policy at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education and director of the National Education Policy Center, is now available here: http://www.tcrecord.org/Content.asp?ContentID=17104.

To describe the strategies, Welner’s Teachers College Record article identifies 12 different approaches, using lighthearted category names such as “The Bum Steer,” “Location, Location, Location,” and “Mad Men.” But the subject itself is of crucial importance, since it raises vital issues concerning equity as well as the reporting of research outcomes.

Researchers and governmental authorities have long known that charter schools generally under-serve a community’s at-risk students. Welner’s article builds on this research to explore the charter school practices that result in those enrollment outcomes.

When charter schools fail to serve a cross-section of their community, they undermine their own potential and they distort the larger system of public education. “It doesn’t have to be this way,” says Welner. “The task for policymakers is to redesign charter school policies in ways that provide choice without undermining other important policy goals. For instance, being innovative doesn’t require being selective or restrictive in enrollments.”

“These practices,” Welner explains, “also make it difficult for researchers to accurately compare the effectiveness of charter and non-charter schools.” High-quality research studies make great efforts to include a comparison group of non-charter school students that matches charter school students in key ways such as race, free and reduced lunch status, and gender.

Yet the many ways charters influence enrollment create daunting obstacles for researchers. Welner cautions researchers and policymakers: “These studies cannot account for all these practices merely by research design or statistical adjustments. Studies of charter school performance are almost surely attributing results to charter school instructional programs that are caused in part by charter school enrollment practices.”

Welner says that he started to write this analysis after reading a February 2013 article written by Reuters reporter Stephanie Simon. Her article described a variety of ways that charter schools “get the students they want.” “I sought to build on Simon’s excellent work,” Welner said. “After reading the Reuters article, I started noticing a variety of other ways in which charter schools influence the makeup of their enrollment.”

He added, “I’m not sure if my ‘Dirty Dozen’ list of practices is complete. There may be others. And readers should keep in mind that some of these tactics have also been used by non-charter public schools.” After decades of market-based and accountability reforms, all public schools now face the same incentives around cost and test-scores. “The difference, of course, is that many of the tactics described in this article are simply not available to non-charter public schools.”

The new article is not an indictment of all charter schools. “There are plenty of charter schools that try to enroll a diverse and representative group of students,” concludes Welner. “But there are plenty of others that use a potent combination of the ‘Dirty Dozen’ practices to shape their enrollments in ways that flout our societal understandings of public schooling.”

Find Kevin Welner’s article on the Teachers College Record website. The article is freely available until May 10^th at:
http://www.tcrecord.org/Content.asp?ContentID=17104. After that, it will be available on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/TCR-Dirty-Dozen.

The National Education Policy Center (NEPC) is housed at the University of Colorado Boulder School of Education. Its mission is to produce and disseminate high-quality, peer-reviewed research to inform education policy discussions. We are guided by the belief that the democratic governance of public education is strengthened when policies are based on sound evidence. For more information about the NEPC, please visit http://nepc.colorado.edu/.

Nation’s Online Elementary and Secondary Schools Expand Rapidly, But Academic Performance Lags Behind Other Public Schools, New Report Finds

elaine — Thu, 02 May 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Virtual Schools in the U.S. 2013: Politics, Performance, Policy, and Research Evidence

National Education Policy Center Study Tracks the Performance of 311 Full-Time
Virtual Schools, Finds Lagging Academic Performance, High Dropout Rates,
Limited Oversight, and Excessive Costs that Drain Millions from Public Coffers

Contact:
Jamie Horwitz, 202/549-4921; jhdcpr@starpower.net
Alex Molnar, 480/797-7261; nepc.molnar@gmail.com

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/bpoxwmd

Boulder, Colo. (May 2, 2013) -- A national study, released today by the National Education Policy Center (NEPC), offers a comprehensive review of 311 virtual schools operating in the United States. It finds serious and systemic problems with the nation’s full-time cyber schools.

University of Colorado, Boulder Professor Alex Molnar, who edited Virtual Schools in the U.S. 2013: Politics, Performance, Policy, and Research Evidence, summed it up this way: “Even a cursory review of virtual schooling in the U.S. reveals an environment much like the legendary wild west. There are outsized claims, lagging performance, intense conflicts, lots of taxpayer money at stake, and very little solid evidence to justify the rapid expansion of virtual schools.”

Lagging Performance – Soaring Enrollment

On the publicly available metrics of Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), virtual schools lag significantly behind traditional brick-and-mortar schools.

AYP provides an indication of a school's academic and non-academic performance (school attendance, the percentage of students taking a state exam, etc.). In the 2010-2011 school year, 52 percent of brick-and-mortar district and charter schools met AYP, contrasted with 23.6 percent of virtual schools – a 28 percentage-point gap. Virtual schools also enroll a far smaller percentage of low-income students, special education students, and English language learners than brick-and-mortar public schools.

“When virtual schools were first coming on the scene, the results looked better,” said Western Michigan University Professor Gary Miron. “It now appears that early adopters of the virtual school model were largely home-schoolers who were used to studying alone and who generally had lots of parental guidance. As virtual schools have expanded, it appears that their performance has slipped dramatically.”

Currently virtual schools enroll more than 200,000 elementary and secondary students in 39 states and the District of Columbia. McLean, Virginia-based K12 Inc. is by far the largest private operator in this sector. In 2011-12, K12 Inc. alone operated 58 full-time virtual schools, enrolling close to 77,000 students. By comparison, the Pearson-owned Connections Academies is second, with 21 schools and more than 27,000 students in the 2010-2011 school year.

Expansion Driven by Lobbying and Advertising Rather than Student Success

Despite virtual schools' track record of students falling behind their peers academically or dropping-out at higher rates, states and districts continue to expand virtual schools and online offerings to students. Between 2008 and 2012, 157 bills that the National Council of State Legislatures categorizes as related to “distance/online/virtual/learning” became law in 39 states, territories, and the District of Columbia.

Publicly-funded virtual school expansion appears to be driven by lobbying and advertising dollars. It is not justified by the research evidence, nor is it governed by thoughtful policy.

Data obtained from Kantar Media, and first reported by USA Today, shows that the 10 largest online school providers spent approximately $100 million in the past five years on advertising -- money that came from public school funds.

Columbia University Professor Luis Huerta, another of the report’s authors, noted that, “In the past two years a number of states, including Wisconsin, Oregon, Louisiana, and Michigan, either raised or eliminated enrollment caps for full-time virtual schools.” Co-authorJennifer King Rice, a University of Maryland Professor, points out that at the same time, ”None of those states passed legislation strengthening accountability and oversight.”

High Cost to Taxpayers

The overall cost to taxpayers for lackluster virtual schools has been significant. Ohio provides a good example; the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that online school enrollment in Ohio topped 30,000 students and that online providers were paid $209 million in public money for the 2010-11 year, but failed to provide a detailed accounting of their expenses to the state.

Ohio pays online charter school operators $6,300 per student; however, according to an investigation by State Impact Ohio, the cost of running these programs is approximately $3,600 per student. High dropout rates might mean that the cost to the provider is even less. Nevertheless, in Ohio and most other states, virtual school operators receive the same allocation as charter schools that pay for buildings, desks, textbooks, and other costs associated with more traditional school settings.

Although virtual technology offers exciting possibilities and some models like blended learning -- where online instruction is mixed with more traditional classrooms -- may hold promise, the consistently poor performance of full-time virtual schools makes it imperative to know more about these schools. The advocates of full-time virtual schools are several years ahead of policymakers and researchers, and new opportunities are being developed and promoted largely by for-profit entities accountable to stockholders rather than to any public constituency.

Stanford University Professor Emeritus Larry Cuban, who contributed a review of current research knowledge on virtual education to the NEPC report and has long followed education technology issues, explained, “The current climate of elementary and secondary school reform that promotes uncritical acceptance of any and all virtual education innovations is not supported by educational research. A model that is built around churn is not sustainable; the unchecked growth of virtual schools is essentially an education tech bubble.”

Recommendations

The authors of the NEPC report conclude that continued rapid expansion of full-time cyber schools is unwise. More research is needed, and to enable such research, state oversight agencies need to require more, and better refined, data. Financial controls and funding unique to cyber schools need to be established.

The NEPC report Virtual Schools in the U.S. 2013: Politics, Performance, Policy, and Research can be found on the web at http://nepc.colorado.edu/publication/virtual-schools-annual-2013.

Along with Professors Molnar, Miron, Huerta, King Rice, and Cuban, contributors to this study included professors Sheryl Shafer of Teachers College – Columbia University, Brian Horvitz of Western Michigan University, and Charisse Gulosino at the University of Memphis.

KIPP Study is Useful, but It Overreaches

elaine — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 06:00:00 +0000

Reference Publication:

Review of KIPP Middle Schools: Impacts on Achievement and Other Outcomes

Contact:

William J. Mathis, (802) 383-0058, wmathis@sover.net
Gregory Camilli, (303) 492 8391, gregory.camilli@colorado.edu

URL for this press release: http://tinyurl.com/cpna3fn

BOULDER, CO (April 30, 2013) – Do middle schools operated by the Knowledge Is Power Program (KIPP) excel in promoting student achievement? A new review gives a second look at a recent study that answered that question “yes.”

In a study released in February, Mathematica Policy Research concluded that, based on achievement test scores, KIPP middle school students had substantially higher test scores than comparison non-KIPP students. A review published today of the Mathematica study finds that while the original evaluation was carefully planned and executed and a positive impact is supported by the evidence, the authors may have overstated the benefits attributable to KIPP.

The study, KIPP Middle Schools: Impacts on Achievement and Other Outcomes, was reviewed for the Think Twice think tank review project by Professor Gregory Camilli of the University of Colorado Boulder. The review is published by the National Education Policy Center, housed at the CU Boulder School of Education.

Using two different approaches, the Mathematica researchers concluded that the KIPP students scored, after three years, higher than comparison students not attending KIPP schools at the equivalent of 11 months of additional learning in math and eight months in reading. Camilli observes that the results are similar in size to those found from some previous educational experiments, including a small experiment with KIPP schools.

Camilli explains that while the KIPP outcomes could be substantial if they were found to persist into later grades, the benefits appear to be overstated in the report.

For one thing, Camilli points out, “translating educational outcomes into ‘months’ of additional learning is an inexact science and can lead to absurd results if taken literally.” Relative to one month of learning from grade 11-12, for example, information supplied by test publishers could be used (in this case misused) to demonstrate that children learn the equivalent of 10 years from kindergarten to first grade. Additionally, reported measures of effectiveness that attempt to take attrition into account are smaller than the estimates used to draw conclusions about the effectiveness of KIPP.

He also finds that the certainty with which the report attributes the effect of KIPP on higher-order reasoning skills is not borne out by evidence – and that that topic “requires additional empirical work to provide greater clarity.”

The Mathematica researchers also found that the impact of KIPP was unevenly distributed across KIPP schools. For example, most, but not all, KIPP schools had a positive impact. Though a few clues emerged from the data, the factors leading to this variation could not be identified. For this reason, Camilli writes that information provided in the report is not complete enough to guide education policy. Finally, Camilli advises that “Future work evaluating the persistence of KIPP impact will be key to drawing a conclusive judgment of the educational significance of KIPP schooling.”

Find Gregory Camilli’s review on the NEPC website at:
http://nepc.colorado.edu/thinktank/review-KIPP-middle-schools/.

Find KIPP Middle Schools: Impacts on Achievement and Other Outcomes, by Christina Clark Tuttle, Brian Gill, Philip Gleason, Virginia Knechtel, Ira Nichols-Barrer, and Alexandra Resch, on the web at:
http://www.mathematica-mpr.com/publications/pdfs/education/KIPP_middle.pdf/.

This review is also found on the GLC website at http://www.greatlakescenter.org/