Explaining key points of the new K-12 education law
Congress last month finally rewrote No Child Left Behind (eight years late) and delivered a new K-12 education law to the country called the Every Student Succeeds Act, or ESSA. The new law js intended to fix some of the most egregious problems with NCLB, and return significant education policy-making power to the states. But there are questions about exactly how much power the states have to change policy, including on accountability systems that have been pushed by the Obama administration for years.
In an effort to learn more about the law, education historian and activist Diane Ravitch asked David P. Cleary, chief of staff to Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee and staff director of the Senate Health Education Labor and Pension Committee, to answer specific questions about ESSA’s provisions to help give direction to the continuing debate about what it actually says. Alexander is the chairman of the Senate education committee, and his efforts were instrumental in the successful effort to write and pass ESSA.
Ravitch has given me permission to publish the questions and answers she isposting on her blog. In an introductory note to Ravitch, Cleary wrote that there are many questions about how the law will be implemented at the federal, state and local levels, and that Alexander plans to hold oversight hearings to monitor implementation. Cleary also wrote:
One of the driving principles behind Chairman Alexander’s efforts to fix No Child Left Behind was to restore to states, school districts, classroom teachers and parents the responsibility for deciding what to do about improving student achievement. This will enable governors, chief state school officers, superintendents, principals, teachers, parents, students, advocates, and the public could grapple with these difficult issues and reach conclusions that work for their state and community.Most importantly, the new law ends No Child Left Behind’s accountability system and also allows states to move in a different direction, if they choose, from many of the policies of No Child Left Behind and the waivers of the past several years.In many ways, ESSA is just the beginning of the story because states will now need to figure out what to do with all of this new flexibility and responsibility.
Here are Ravitch’s first, second and third questions, with Cleary’s responses — both short and long answers to each query. More will be published in the coming days. Cleary’s references to “the Secretary” refer to the U.S. secretary of education.
Q) How will ESSA affect student standardized testing? Most educators and parents believe that there is too much testing and they want less of it. What does ESSA do to reduce testing and the high stakes attached to it?
Cleary’s short answer:
ESSA should significantly affect testing. Through testimony we learned that although the federally required math and reading tests provide valuable information on student learning to teachers, parents, states, and the public, many states and school districts administer many more tests than necessary, largely in part to prepare for the one-time high-stakes tests required under No Child Left Behind. State and school district leaders agree that shorter and fewer tests are needed. For example, we learned that a Fort Myers, Fla., school district gave its students more than 160 tests in preparation for the federal test[s] required under NCLB.
ESSA creates an opportunity for states to reevaluate the amount of tests their students take and how the results of those tests are used. While we kept the Explaining key points of the new K-12 education law - The Washington Post:
