If you like to monitor the high school exit-exam landscape, you have some great reading to curl up with today. (I'm not embarrassed to admit it. I like this stuff.) Yesterday, the Center on Education Policy put out the eighth in an annual series of studies examining the exams that about half the states require students to pass to get a diploma. (Here are all the previous ones. And just for good measure for all you exit-exam nerds, here are some policy briefs they've done about this issue as well.)

Okay. So what's in this most recent report? First, author Ying Zhang found that stakes are rising for the exit exams. Back in 2002, only two states used such tests for accountability under No Child Left Behind; now 24 do so. Since 2002, 16 more states have started withholding diplomas from students who do not pass exit exams.

Also—interestingly but not surprisingly—not all states use the same cut score for passing the test as they do for NCLB. Fourteen states use the same score for those two purposes, but nine use a lower score for NCLB purposes.

The trend toward end-of-course tests continues. States are moving away from comprehensive and minimum-competency exams, which are often pegged to a frighteningly low level, in favor of a battery of subject-specific tests given at the end of each course in that subject. The study found that 15 states plan to be using end-of-course tests as their exit exams by 2015, up from five currently, and two in 2002.

The report also examines what states are doing to create alternate pathways to graduation for students who are unable to pass the exit exams.

Posted by Catherine Gewertz at 9:23 AM | Permalink | 1 Comment | TrackBacks (0)

Here's a new one when it comes to raising the high school graduation rate: take the offender to court. That's what the ACLU has done. It has filed a lawsuit against the state of Florida over the low graduation rate in Palm Beach County. The civil-rights group originally filed the lawsuit against the county, but it was dismissed on the argument that the state, not the county, was the legally appropriate defendant. Now it's refiled the action against Florida.

The lawyer on the case, Chris Hansen, told me in an e-mail that as far as they know, the case is unique; they know of no other lawsuits in Florida or nationally that have been "based solely on graduation rates." State officials haven't commented (see the Associated Press story in The New York Times), and district officials didn't have much to say, either, except to say their grad rate is 80 percent, much higher than the ACLU contends.

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Those of you following adolescent literacy issues will want to know that a comprehensive literacy bill was filed in the U.S. Senate yesterday that would provide a huge boost in funding for literacy instruction. Take a look at this post by my colleague Mary Ann Zehr, over at the Curriculum Matters blog. Note that the bill would set aside 40 percent of its funding for literacy instruction at the middle and high school levels. Mary Ann provides links to a summary of the bill, and to a story she wrote about an earlier draft. UPDATE: See Mary Ann's story on the bill here.

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A quick roundup of intriguing news in the high school space:

The South Dakota state board of education sets the bar higher for graduation, deciding that all students must take geometry and Algebra II, and chemistry or physics. (I can already hear the teenage groans.) North Carolina decides that some students who didn't make the cut to graduate long ago can now get retroactive diplomas. And school districts in Illinois are apparently allowed to use their own definitions of what it means to be a junior in high school, with some, um, more flattering results.

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Ever wonder about the data policymakers cite when arguing that the U.S. has slipped on college attainment, and needs to step it up? Well, former NCES analyst Cliff Adelman did, and he's raising questions about it in a new paper. My colleague Debbie Viadero has a story on our Web site about it. Take a look; these numbers are a key part of the foundation for President Obama's "college for all" push.

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The Ford Foundation announced today that it will commit $100 million over seven years to high school improvement in seven cities.

The New York City-based philanthropy will make grants aimed at four areas: ensuring "robust" state funding for education; encouraging high-quality, collaborative teaching; designing accountability systems based on "more meaningful" methods of assessment than standardized tests, and making good use of an extended school day or year.

The foundation said it has teamed up with parents, teachers, community groups and others in its chosen focus cities: New York City, Los Angeles, Denver, Philadelphia, Detroit, Chicago and Newark, N.J.

Among the early grant recipients so far: The American Institutes for Research in Behavioral Sciences, to develop new school-finance models; Stanford University education professor Linda Darling-Hammond, to write a series of papers about assessment methods; and the American Federation of Teachers Innovation Fund, for "innovation efforts" by its local affiliates involving teachers, administrators and parents.

Jeannie Oakes, widely known for her work on equity and diversity issues as a professor of education at UCLA, is now Ford's director of education and scholarship, and will oversee the new initiative.

Posted by Catherine Gewertz at 9:48 AM | Permalink | 2 Comments | TrackBacks (0)

The need for better teacher training is widely discussed and debated. Now a new report urges specific types of preparation for those aspiring to teach at the high school level.

The study, issued today by the Alliance for Excellent Education, calls for teacher candidates to be better trained in adolescent literacy and in content-specific pedagogy.

Those are the only two recommendations in the report, though, that are specific to high school. The rest—such as the need for better training in the use of data—could apply as easily to teachers of lower grades. According to the report's author, Marcy Miller, that's because there is little research about what types of preparation are most needed at the high school level.

UPDATE: Check out our story on the report.

Please chime in: Does training for pre-service high school teachers need to change, and if so, how?

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The stories keep rolling in about the booming demand for community colleges. Just last week, we told you about a report from the Pew Research Center showing that community college enrollment was driving an overall increase in college enrollment. The New York Times is one of many newspapers that reported recently on the surge.

Now comes an Associated Press story describing the boom and questioning whether President Obama's pledge of increased support to two-year colleges is enough to adequately manage the increased demand. Research on community colleges, as we reported here recently, also raises questions about whether they can play an effective role in meeting Obama's goal of putting more degrees in Americans' hands. The American Enterprise Institute's Rick Hess was pretty clear about his doubts in a blog post last summer.

What do you think?

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Those of you interested in adolescent literacy might want to take a look at what's going on at Buckhorn High School, in a small town in Alabama. I visited the school recently and wrote about its ten-year obsession with teaching literacy in every subject. At Buckhorn, every teacher teaches reading comprehension and writing strategies geared to their subject. It takes some pretty interesting forms; check it out.

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An interesting combination of reports tumbled out this week, with implications for the college- and career-readiness agenda. One finds that college enrollment is at an all-time high—driven mostly by growth at the community-college level—and the other finds that states are lowering their academic standards.

The first study is from the the Pew Research Center. (See the AP story about it on our Web site, and the The New York Times story.)

The second report is from the National Center for Education Statistics (EdWeek story here, AP here, New York Times here.)

Few are surprised by the finding that states lowered their standards to avoid the hand-slaps of No Child Left Behind (see, for instance, Robert Pondiscio at the Core Knowledge blog: "I'm shocked, shocked!!"). That's been anticipated, studied and reported on before.

Unfortunately, it's just more fodder for pessimism that schools are not up to the job of holding all students to high expectations at a time when they risk some pretty scary life outcomes without solid postsecondary education.

And while one can cheer that community-college enrollments are up, the other Pew finding that four-year college enrollments are flat offers some cause for concern, since outcomes for those with bachelor's degrees tend to be better than for those with certificates or two-year degrees.

One bright spot in the Pew report: the share of young adults graduating from high school is at an all-time high, a full percentage point higher in 2008 than it was in 2007.

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