No Child Left Behind is Gone. But What Does the New Ed Law Mean for K-12 Funding?
The latest version of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act was recently signed into law by President Obama. The new law, christened the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), replaces its predecessor, the much-maligned No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) of 2001. "Good riddance" sums up the sentiments of many educators regarding the demise of NCLB, but the question now is what ESSA means for students, their teachers and principals, and for the funders who support many K-12 initiatives and reforms.
(See my earlier post on what ESSA means for funders and nonprofits in the early childhood ed space.)
While the new law is barely in the implementation stage, a look at its provisions reveals some important details for K-12 education and those funders who have made ed reform a key element of their grantmaking strategy.
Testing Here to Stay
Standardized testing in K-12 schools is not going away. ESSA largely preserves the requirements for standardized testing in grades three to eight and high school, much as NCLB did. However, in a step away from its predecessor, the new law offers states and school districts greater flexibility in the design of those assessment tools, as well as in accountability for results. This contrasts with the more punitive approach of NCLB, which triggered federally mandated improvement requirements for schools and districts that failed to meet academic performance standards.
In addition to continued testing requirements, states and districts must continue to disaggregate their assessment data by various student groups, such as low-income students, racial and ethnic groups, special education students and English language learners. This means the use of data to drive decisions will remain an important part of K-12 practices.
The prominent role for data in education decisions is good news for a wide variety of funders who have awarded millions in grants to boost the capacity of states and school districts to collect, manage, and understand their data. The Gates, Casey, Dell, and Ford foundations are among the leading funders of the Data Quality Campaign and similar organizations supporting better data use in education. But as we have seen, education data can be used (or misused) in a number of ways.
As a decision-making tool, data can act as a hammer or as a flashlight. Where NCLB advocated the hammer approach, piling costly sanctions and improvement measures on schools that fail to measure up based on standardized test results, the language of ESSA at least suggests a preference for the “flashlight” approach, in which data becomes a means for highlighting problem areas and populations, and is used for plans to address deficiencies. For low-performing schools, ESSA requires districts to work with teachers and school staff to develop evidence-based plans.
However, more punitive measures remain an option. If schools continue to founder after no more than four years under a district turnaround plan, states can step in with their own plans, including firing the principal or converting the campus into a charter school.
High Standards (But Not Necessarily Common Core)
Contrary to the concerns of Obama administration critics, who feared the president would seize an opportunity to mandate the Common Core State Standards nationwide, ESSA requires only that states adopt “challenging” academic standards. The Secretary of Education is strictly prohibited from requiring or even encouraging states to adopt a particular set of standards, including the Common Core.
The Gates Foundation has been the leading funder pouring millions into No Child Left Behind is Gone. But What Does the New Ed Law Mean for K-12 Funding? - Inside Philanthropy: Fundraising Intelligence - Inside Philanthropy:
