State seeks input on new eduction law, but restrictions linger
As the Texas Education Agency seeks input on how to implement a federal education law intended to give states more decision-making power, it can't actually adhere to suggestions on two of the bigger issues: backing off the weight given to standardized tests in accountability rankings and lessening the amount of time students spend taking such tests.
That's because much of Texas' accountability and testing systems are written into state law, which were just recently rewritten and remain more stringent that what's mandated by federal law.
"It is not allowable under state law," said Mark Baxter, the TEA's director of policy and planning, who is leading the agency's internal efforts to implement the Every Student Succeeds Act. "We still have some constraints on what we can access under ESSA, but we're always willing to implement changes that Texas Legislature wants us to."
Passed by Congress in 2015, ESSA replaces the largely reviled No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 that centralized a considerable amount of decision-making power with the U.S. Department of Education and required states to implement standardized tests to track student performance. It also required collecting specific data for subgroups of students, such as ethnic minorities and students from low-socioeconomic backgrounds.
No Child Left Behind
But a No Child Left Behind mandate that required states to achieve 100 percent student proficiency in math and reading by the 2013-2014 school year caused frustrations to boil over in 2011. So many states lined up for waivers exempting them from the requirements that lawmakers developed ESSA to replace it.
"Texas or any state, in theory, can design new accountability systems more suited to the educational realities they face in each state," said Deven Carlson, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Oklahoma.
The TEA is seeking public and school district comment on several aspects now, including how to support struggling schools, what nonacademic measurers it should use to assess school performance and what graduation rate it should aim to reach by 2030.
Revamped rules
The state agency will wait until June 2017 to submit its plan for implementing ESSA to the U.S. Department of Education just in case Texas lawmakers make any changes to accountability or testing during the upcoming spring legislative session.
But such changes are unlikely since they approved a new accountability system last year that will rate schools and districts with A-F letter grades when it debuts in 2018. The new system's measures will blunt the significance of standardized test performance by making 45 percent of a school's rating based on a variety of factors, such as access and completion of advanced courses, dropout rates and parental involvement.
While standardized test scores will have less of a bearing on rankings, Daniel Bowen, an assistant professor of educational administration with Texas A&M University, said it's surprising lawmakers have remained mum on scaling back testing and accountability measures in light of ESSA.
"It's kind of surprising and shocking to me, just because it seems like an easy political win to state that you're against over-testing. So I don't know of any drawbacks for the TEA or the Legislature to State seeks input on new eduction law, but restrictions linger - Houston Chronicle:
