Cairo Association of Teachers - Newsletter

CAT Tracks for March 22, 2007 UNIONS UNITE OVER NCLB

From Education Week...

Views of AFT, NEA on Reauthorization Getting Closer

National Education Association President Reg Weaver testifies at a joint House-Senate hearing on the No Child Left Behind Act last week. The NEA is part of a coalition seeking a major overhaul of the law. —Hector Emanuel for Education Week

By David J. Hoff
Washington

After five years of following separate paths, the two national teachers’ unions are now taking a unified position on accountability under the No Child Left Behind Act.

The National Education Association has been a staunch critic of the 5-year-old law, maintaining that it is an unfunded mandate with unattainable student-achievement goals. The American Federation of Teachers has argued that the law’s goals of raising achievement were sound, but that its policies needed revising.

Last week, when the AFT announced it had endorsed the proposals of the Forum on Educational Accountability, it joined the NEA in a coalition that is lobbying to radically overhaul the NCLB law’s accountability measures.

“We don’t align on every issue,” Edward J. McElroy, the president of the 1.3 million-member AFT, said in an interview last week. “But predominantly we line up on the major issues.”

Mr. McElroy said the AFT decided to join the Forum on Educational Accountability after re-evaluating where the coalition of 100-plus groups stood compared with the AFT’s positions. He did not outline which of the forum’s positions diverged from those of the AFT.

In another alliance that could complicate efforts to reauthorize the NCLB law, more than 50 Republicans, including the No. 2 GOP leader in the House, introduced bills last week that would remove the law’s accountability measures and its requirement that states assess students every year.

Mr. McElroy outlined the AFT’s position on the reauthorization of the No Child Left Behind Act before a hearing of House and Senate members. In a rare event, the House Education and Labor Committee and the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee held the March 13 joint hearing to discuss changes to the law, which is scheduled to be reauthorized this year.

Other witnesses included NEA President Reg Weaver and representatives of the Council of the Great City Schools, the Council of Chief State School Officers, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and a blue-ribbon panel on the NCLB law convened by the Aspen Institute.

While the Senate committee has already held its first NCLB hearings this year, last week’s session was the first held by the House committee since Democrats regained control of Congress.

Rep. George Miller, D-Calif., said the House committee, which he chairs, plans many hearings on the law as part of “a bipartisan, comprehensive, and inclusive process.”

Much of the discussion centered on how to tinker with the law’s central provisions establishing a federal accountability system for educational performance, seeking to improve the quality of teachers, and setting a goal that all students be proficient in reading and mathematics by the end of the 2013-14 school year.

Tinkering or Rewriting?

In summing up the witnesses’ recommendations, Rep. Michael Castle, R-Del., said that “No Child Left Behind is fundamentally very good for education, but may need some changes.”

That may have summarized the tenor of last week’s hearing, but Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich., a member of the panel, said the law gives the federal government too much control over state instructional and assessment policies.

Later in the week, as he indicated he would earlier this month, Rep. Hoekstra unveiled a bill that would give states wide latitude in setting the achievement goals for students and the accountability systems to measure progress toward those goals.

Rep. Roy Blunt, the Republican whip, was among the 52 members who have endorsed Rep. Hoekstra’s bill, and Sens. John Cornyn, R-Texas, and Jim DeMint, R-S.C., have introduced a similar bill in the Senate.

Although the AFT’s policy shift on NCLB is subtle, members of the Forum on Educational Accountability said it is significant. AFT officials attended organizational meetings for the forum in its planning stages three years ago, but decided not to join the group early in the process, said Bruce Hunter, a chief lobbyist for the American Association of School Administrators, who was instrumental in the formation of the forum.

“They are looking at different ways of measuring progress,” Mr. Hunter said of the AFT. “I think it shows that their members have weighed in with them, really clearly.”

The change is noteworthy, another observer said, because the AFT has endorsed standards-based accountability measures for more than a decade, dating back to the leadership of the late Albert Shanker. But there are no other signs that the AFT is changing its positions on that policy approach, added Joseph P. Viteritti, a professor of public policy at Hunter College, City University of New York.

“I think we have to be careful not to overread this,” Mr. Viteritti said. “This is a significant development, but we’re not sure what it means yet.”

At the House-Senate education committees’ hearing, Mr. McElroy and Mr. Weaver offered similar criticisms of the NCLB’s accountability system.

The system “misidentifies as failing thousands of schools that are making real progress,” Mr. McElroy told the lawmakers. “Students, parents, teachers, and communities know that their schools are making solid academic progress, yet they’re told that they’re not making the grade. It’s devastating and demoralizing.”

Mr. Weaver also characterized the NCLB accountability measures as unfair. In his written testimony, he urged Congress to allow states to adopt their own accountability systems that would use several different ways to determine student progress.

Under the NCLB accountability system, states must assess students in reading and mathematics in grades 3-8 and at least once in high schools. To make adequate yearly progress, districts and schools must meet achievement targets for all students and various subgroups according to race, ethnicity, demographics, and students’ special needs.

The national teachers’ unions haven’t always been so close on the wide-ranging federal law, an overhaul of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act.

The 3.2 million-member NEA has been highly critical of the law. In 2005, the NEA filed a federal lawsuit seeking to have the law declared invalid because, the suit contended, it violated its own prohibition against forcing state and local officials to spend money for its implementation.

A U.S. District Court judge in Detroit later dismissed the case, and the lawsuit is on appeal.

The AFT, by contrast, has generally supported the law. It launched a campaign in 2005 outlining ways to change the law to make it an effective way to spur increased student achievement. The campaign includes a well-read Web log called “Let’s Get it Right.”

Coalition-Building

In his statement to the committees, Mr. Weaver of the NEA outlined many of the goals of the Forum on Educational Accountability. The coalition argues that accountability decisions should be made on the basis of a variety of test scores and other measures, such as teacher grades and portfolios of students’ work. It also suggests that schools should define how they would meet targets for improving the quality of their teachers and expanding the involvement of parents.

The NEA, the AASA, and the National Center for Fair & Open Testing, or FairTest, helped start the forum three years ago. Mr. Hunter said AFT representatives stopped attending the meetings because they supported the law’s system of making accountability decisions based on test scores.

Other members of the forum include the National School Boards Association, the Coalition of Essential Schools, and the National PTA. The coalition also has members from a variety of civil rights and religious advocacy organizations.

When I retire (ha, ha, ha, ha...), may have to move to Kansas just so that I can vote for this guy!

From the Kansas.com website...

NCLB taking joy out of teaching

BY REP. JERRY MORAN

The education profession has long been known for inadequate pay but high job satisfaction. Teachers have been willing to forfeit material gain for the joy of seeing the eyes of their students light up as they grow and learn.

Lately, the job satisfaction that brought so many teachers into the profession seems to have left the classroom. Unfortunately, much of this development can be attributed to the No Child Left Behind law.

The joy of teaching has been replaced by pressure-filled staff meetings in which educators talk not about how to help a child learn, but rather their school's test scores. Morale in the education world has diminished, and more teachers are at wit's end.

Recently, a teacher in Lindsborg told me of her frustration. She wrote, "I am a first-year teacher, and I am beginning to get very discouraged. I went into the teaching profession to help students learn and to encourage them to follow their dreams. However, I am finding that more and more of my time is spent preparing students for standardized tests. These tests do not prepare students for any career. They only teach students how to take a test. With all these tests, we don't have time to teach. I truly feel that the time and effort I put into teaching is not worth my while. No Child Left Behind is wonderful in theory, but impossible to carry out. Not every child is equal in ability, and no teacher should be expected to make it so."

With the number of teachers leaving the profession exceeding the number of teachers entering the profession by 23 percent, this young educator's thoughts should be a warning. If we have to shut the doors on schools in Kansas, it will not be because of lack of students; it will be because we cannot find the teachers to fill the vacancies.

Congress must be sensitive to the responsibility it holds in encouraging educators to stay in the classroom and continue their chosen profession. Lawmakers need to strive for improvements in our education system, but we must make sure we do not overregulate the classroom. We must not take the joy and passion out of this noble profession by requiring things that are simply not possible.

This year, Congress is set to examine the NCLB law and potentially reauthorize it. While I voted against NCLB when it was originally passed, I look forward to hearing from Kansans about how we should reform and change this policy. My hope is that Congress will make the changes necessary to help teachers succeed as they educate our greatest asset -- our young people -- and fulfill the jobs they love.

Jerry Moran of Hays is a Republican congressman representing the 1st District of Kansas.

Or...just switch party allegiance?

From the Christian Science Monitor...

GOP lawmakers are among the biggest critics of Bush's school reform program.

By Gail Russell Chaddock | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
WASHINGTON

Support for No Child Left Behind – President Bush's signature education reform – is fraying as it heads into reauthorization this year.

The heaviest criticism is coming from within his own party. Conservative Republicans in the House and Senate introduced bills last week that allow states to opt out of most of the law's requirements, while keeping federal funding. Backers of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) say that move would gut the law.

Even supporters say that changes are needed.

"This is a critical year. It's very important that we perfect and tweak NCLB as we move forward," US Education Secretary Margaret Spellings told urban school leaders in Washington this week. "There are lots of forces aligning on both sides of the poles to unravel or unwind NCLB, but I don't think that's going to happen," she told the Council of the Great City Schools.

At the heart of this sweeping education reform is a mandate that states annually test students in Grades 3 through 8 in reading and math. Schools that fail to show "adequate yearly progress" in student achievement face sanctions ranging from cuts in federal funding to a requirement to shut down.

The reform passed Congress with big bipartisan majorities in 2001. But problems in implementing NCLB have spawned criticism from principals, teachers, parents, education groups, and across the political spectrum.

Doubts loom especially large for GOP conservatives, who swept into power in the House in 1995 on a promise to reduce the size of the federal government and abolish the US Department of Education.

"It's pretty obvious that the consensus that led to [NCLB] six years ago is unraveling," says Chester Finn, president of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute and a former Reagan-era education official. "How badly it unravels over what period of time is what we don't know yet."

Democrats want more federal funding

Democrats, who now control both the House and Senate, say that they initially supported NCLB on the promise that federal funding would give schools the resources they needed to implement the new law. While federal funding for public schools has increased by a third since the law was enacted, it still has been underfunded by some $70.9 billion, below levels authorized by law, say critics ranging from top Democrats to education associations and teachers unions.

"Year after year, the president sends us a budget that comes nowhere close to funding No Child Left Behind at an adequate level," said Sen. Tom Harkin (D) of Iowa, who chairs the education subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee, at a hearing on NCLB funding last week. The president's budget for fiscal year '08 underfunds the law by $14.8 billion, he adds. "The numbers have gotten almost laughable."

Democrats also aim to revise aspects of how the law is implemented, including revising strategies for turning around low-performing schools. Of some 90,000 public schools, about 9,000 have been targeted by NCLB as needing improvement. "We want to make turning around our most struggling schools a priority in this reauthorization," says Roberto Rodriguez, senior education adviser to Sen. Edward Kennedy (D) of Massachusetts, who chairs the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions. That panel is considering shifting to alternative measures of "adequate yearly progress," including models that account for the improvement of individual students over a school year, rather than whether they meet target proficiency standards.

But Democrats say they are still committed to a key assumption of the NCLB law: that the federal government should be involved in leveraging higher achievement in local schools. That is not the case among Republicans.

On the House side, 52 Republicans, including minority whip Roy Blunt, are cosponsoring the A-Plus Act, introduced by Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R) of Michigan. Thirty-three Republicans voted against the NCLB bill, most of whom are cosponsoring the Hoekstra bill. This bill, along with a companion bill in the Senate, revives a formula that drove GOP education policy in the 1990s: that the best route to accountability is through local control and parental choice, not a bigger federal footprint on education.

"We must move education decisionmaking out of Washington closer to where it belongs – with parents and teachers," said Sen. John Cornyn (R) of Texas, a cosponsor of the Senate version of this bill and typically one of the strongest supporters of the Bush administration in the Senate.

In a bid to bridge the gap in GOP ranks, House majority leader John Boehner (R) of Ohio is reminding Republicans that choice was once a part of the No Child Left Behind bill, but was dropped during negotiations with Democrats. Mr. Boehner was one of the original sponsors of NCLB with Rep. George Miller (D) of California. President Bush signed the bill into law in Boehner's district.

"As the No Child Left Behind Act comes up for reauthorization, House Republicans will challenge Democrats to explain why we can't provide more choices for parents and more local control for states and communities that are willing to commit to increasing student achievement," Boehner said in a statement.

Few use school choice provision

Under the terms of existing NCLB law, students attending chronically low- performing schools can choose to attend more successful public schools. But the provision has been little used, because so few seats are available in alternative schools. Conservatives want to offer such students $4,000 scholarships to attend private schools, including religious schools.

"Even the two relatively minor choice options in NCLB have proven to be relatively ineffective because the powers that be have found ways to avoid them," says Michael Franc, vice president of government relations for the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. "The more robust choice provisions never made it through. Conservatives believe that choice is the ultimate accountability."

But the choice option sets up a conflict within the bipartisan NCLB coalition that could sink prospects for reauthorization this year – putting adjustments to the bill beyond the 2008 presidential election.

Democrats, strongly backed by teachers unions, say that private-school vouchers would drain critically needed federal dollars from public schools. They oppose the move.

"There is still strong middle ground for NCLB," says Sandy Kress, a former top Bush education adviser, who now consults with education and business groups. But he warns that the opt-out proposed by Republicans could sink the reauthorization. "Republicans used to stand for rigor and standards, but no money for education. Now they seem to be for the money, but no standards."

Meanwhile, Congress is pursuing hearings on the new law in both the House and Senate, with hopes of taking up legislation by early summer. Education groups are urging early action.