States Gaining a Say on School Accountability
Whether a rewrite of the No Child Left Behind Act makes it over the finish line this year, the federally driven accountability system at the heart of the law seems destined to go the way of the Blockbuster video.
The Obama administration has already opened the door to major flexibility by issuing waivers from the NCLB law, the current version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.
And now, a pair of ESEA rewrite bills headed to conference in Congress would give states acres of new running room when it comes to setting student achievement goals, figuring out how much tests matter, evaluating teachers, and more.
Even if those bills aren't finished by the time President Barack Obama leaves office, presidential candidates in both political parties have either embraced the general direction of the legislation or demanded even more flexibility for states.
If states do win new freedom, what will they do with it? And will the new systems they build be better than the current ones, or will they leave poor and minority students behind?
Some state chiefs are chomping at the bit for greater control, and the chance to experiment with new approaches.
"You're not going to get innovation on these things unless you allow states to be laboratories of policy change," said John White, the Louisiana state superintendent of education.
If the new federal law blesses a state-driven approach, White is interested in giving schools double credit for helping students with disabilities make progress, something he hasn't gotten permission to do under waivers.
Others aren't so optimistic that new federal freedom will produce good results.
"I don't think there's any basis to say there's going to be a lot of people choosing rigorous accountability," said Sandy Kress, who helped write the NCLB law during President George W. Bush's first term in office.
The law, passed in 2002, capitalized on growing attention to accountability at the state level. But Kress doesn't see that same attention now.
"It's being chosen less and less on its own, particularly without the federal pressure to do it," he said.
Holding the Line
The Obama administration shares those concerns, and has made it clear that it wants strong language on accountability in the final version of the ESEA update.
Shifting Landscape
The federal government got involved in accountability in a big way in 2002, with the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act. The Obama administration changed the game in key areas, and House and Senate legislation to rewrite the law—the current version of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act—would do so as well.
No Child Left Behind Act
The law called for states to develop challenging academic standards and test their students in grades 3 through 8 and once in high school. Schools that missed annual achievement targets—either for all their students, or for a particular group of children, such as English-language learners—faced increasingly serious sanctions. The law’s ultimate goal was to bring every student to the “proficient” level on state tests by the 2013-14 school year, but in practice, no state got all its students over that bar.
The law called for states to develop challenging academic standards and test their students in grades 3 through 8 and once in high school. Schools that missed annual achievement targets—either for all their students, or for a particular group of children, such as English-language learners—faced increasingly serious sanctions. The law’s ultimate goal was to bring every student to the “proficient” level on state tests by the 2013-14 school year, but in practice, no state got all its students over that bar.
NCLB Waivers
In 2011, the Obama administration allowed states to get out from under many of the mandates of the NCLB law–including the 2013-14 proficiency deadline—as long as they embraced the administration’s education redesign priorities. Among those: teacher evaluation through test scores, higher standards, and dramatic school turnarounds for the lowest-achieving 5 percent of “priority” schools, plus interventions for another 10 percent of “focus” schools. Right now, 42 states and the District of Columbia have waivers.
In 2011, the Obama administration allowed states to get out from under many of the mandates of the NCLB law–including the 2013-14 proficiency deadline—as long as they embraced the administration’s education redesign priorities. Among those: teacher evaluation through test scores, higher standards, and dramatic school turnarounds for the lowest-achieving 5 percent of “priority” schools, plus interventions for another 10 percent of “focus” schools. Right now, 42 states and the District of Columbia have waivers.
Pending ESEA Reauthorization
Under both House and Senate bills, states would have to stick with the NCLB law’s testing schedule. But they could decide how much weight to give those tests in gauging school performance and could set their own goals for student achievement. There would be no requirement that states identify a certain percentage of schools as low-performing, or use any specific turnaround techniques. Both bills would also open the door to some sort of local assessment, although the House bill goes further than the Senate measure.
Under both House and Senate bills, states would have to stick with the NCLB law’s testing schedule. But they could decide how much weight to give those tests in gauging school performance and could set their own goals for student achievement. There would be no requirement that states identify a certain percentage of schools as low-performing, or use any specific turnaround techniques. Both bills would also open the door to some sort of local assessment, although the House bill goes further than the Senate measure.
For instance, the White House would like to see a final bill require states to single out 5 percent of their schools as low-performing and take the lead in fixing them, like waiver states must do now.
But even if the administration is successful in beefing up protections for struggling students, it's unclear how much those changes will influence some emerging state systems.
California, for example, is already designing a new accountability system that would give districts broad leeway in how they hold their schools accountable. The draft plan is silent on how the state would have to identify and help low-performing schools.
That's a conscious choice, said Keric Ashley, the deputy superintendent.
"I don't think California cares about identifying the lowest 5 percent [of schools] in our state," he said. "That's a federal rule that may continue under ESEA [reauthorization]," and the state will comply, "but that's not going to drive the system we create."
The picture of a state-driven, post-NCLB, post-waivers accountability era is still emerging, and may not come into focus for another four or five years, as states revisit their laws and regulations in the wake of new flexibility, experts say.
Still, waiver applications, trends, and interviews with state chiefs themselves offer clues to what the future may hold.
Some states are beginning to experiment with accountability systems that they say present a more holistic approach to teaching and learning, taking into account noncognitive factors such as "grit," and substituting performance tasks for traditional tests.
States are also moving toward systems that embrace a broader definition of what it means to be "college- and career ready." They're using factors like Advanced Placement participation and dual enrollment, or giving schools credit for career certification.
In some states, not much may change, at least not right away. Chiefs in Minnesota and New Mexico said that, by and large, they're happy with the accountability and teacher effectiveness systems they've developed under waivers.
"We would probably just keep our accountability system the way that it is," said Brenda Cassellius, Minnesota's education commissioner. The legislature may tinker with the state's teacher-evaluation system, which calls for test scores to make up 35 percent of a teacher's overall rating, Cassellius said, but she doesn't envision dropping the test-score requirement altogether.
Minnesota may not be alone there. Thirty-nine states have some sort of teacher-evaluation policy on the books, either in law or regulation, that requires student States Gaining a Say on School Accountability - Education Week:
