January 2011 Archives

Atul Gawande's latest New Yorker article on efforts to rein in health care costs by better serving the highest-cost/highest-need patients is great reading. But this paragraph near the end particularly jumped out at me:

Yet the stakes in health-care hot-spotting are enormous, and go far beyond health care. A recent report on more than a decade of education-reform spending in Massachusetts detailed a story found in every state. Massachusetts sent nearly a billion dollars to school districts to finance smaller class sizes and better teachers' pay, yet every dollar ended up being diverted to covering rising health-care costs. For each dollar added to school budgets, the costs of maintaining teacher health benefits took a dollar and forty cents.

Health care costs are a bigger than often recognized part of what we're talking about when we talk about "unsustainable cost structures" in K-12 public education.

Costs for educators' healthcare benefits have been rising rapidly, in a way that is both not sustainable and cuts into funding for other types of compensation. When people talk about this at all, they tend to talk about teachers' "Cadillac health plans"—and its true that public educators do tend to have much more generous health benefits than the typical worker. But it's important to recognize that that's only part of the issue. Teacher health care costs are affected by the same forces that are spurring out-of-control cost growth across our entire health care system. And because health benefits make up a larger share of teachers' total compensation than they do for many other workers, rocketing health care costs have a particularly outsized budgetary impact here.

As states and districts confront the need to rein in spending growth and improve productivity in K-12 education, they're also going to need to deal with health care cost growth, and there is going to be pressure to adopt less generous teachers healthcare benefits—which will obviously be unpopular with teachers.

Gawande's article, though, got me wondering if there are some alternatives here. One of the really interesting focuses in health care reform—and an area that Gawande's journalism often emphasizes—is the idea that we can rein in health care cost growth not just by taking the ax to services, but also by improving efficiency and coordination in our fragmented and dysfunctional health care system, and that some of those strategies can actually generate improved outcomes while reining in costs. But implementing these strategies requires significant changes in how the system and its participants behave, changes that may complicate the lives or threaten the interests of entrenched groups (sound familiar, anyone in education?). There are some promising initiatives underway (such as those Gawande describes) and policies in the recent health care legislation designed to alter some of the incentives here. But it's really just a beginning.

States, districts, and teachers' unions seem to be ideally positioned to work together to pursue some of the types of cost-reducing and efficiency-enhancing reforms Gawande and other health reform experts write about, and to do so at significant scale. Public education systems are major employers and purchasers of health care, and all parties have major incentives to work towards ways to rein in costs while minimizing cuts in services. Other labor unions—such as the Atlantic City casino workers union in Gawande's article—are already engaging in such initiatives. I'm probably overly optimistic here, but at least it's worth thinking about.

On another note, I think one of the biggest problems in education policy is the isolation of education debates from other industries and policy spheres. A lot of the challenges facing health care reformers—reining in cost growth, recognizing and rewarding quality and outcomes rather than procedures, modernizing delivery, improving equity and efficiency, getting better at preventative health and changing patient and doctor behavior—have real overlaps with challenges we face in seeking to improve public education. Moreover, we know that skyrocketing health care costs have real impacts on educational productivity, and also that educational attainment has real impacts on individuals' later health outcomes. But there's very little combined discussion or sharing of learning across the two sectors. That's unfortunate and probably impoverishes our ability to develop effective solutions in both spheres.

Posted by Sara Mead at 9:48 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Despite all the hype leading up to it, there was, as my colleague Andrew Rotherham notes, not a lot of substance on K-12 education in tonight's State of the Union Address. Most of what was there was not new (see below) or feel-goody: calls for parental responsibility, calls to respect teachers, calls on young people to become teachers.

Not only was there not much of a push on ESEA reauthorization, but the dynamic in the room also didn't seem particularly promising there: Sure, there was some clapping for the President's call to "replace No Child Left Behind with a law that is more flexible and focused on what's best for our kids," but the total lack of clapping for RTT, which presumably offers the blueprint of the administration's key priorities for ESEA reauthorization, seems much more telling in terms of the prospects for bipartisan action there.

In light of that and the emphasis on competitiveness, STEM, and higher education in the speech, don't be surprised if we see relatively more attention to higher education going forward--not surprising as we head towards an election year, when college affordability is typically seen as a bigger winner with middle-class voters than ed reform issues. Unfortunately, tonight that meant plugging the administration's $10,000 college tax credit, which, while probably appealing to middle class families concerned with college affordability, is costly (particularly problematic in light of tonight's deficit emphasis and the looming Pell grant shortfall issue), problematic in terms of distributive impacts and interactions with other financial aid programs, and probably doesn't do all that much in terms of moving us toward the President's stated goal of increasing postsecondary attainment to restore the U.S. to first-in-the world in postsecondary attainment by 2020.

I found that the biggest disappointment of the speech as relates to education, followed by the total absence of early childhood (Not that I was expecting to hear anything about early childhood tonight).

But whatever disillusionment I felt was immediately cancelled out by the President's call to "stop expelling talented, responsible young people who can staff our research labs, start new businesses, and further enrich this nation"--invoking both the DREAM Act and the need to enable highly skilled foreign students who earn college or graduate degrees in our postsecondary institutions the opportunity to stay in this country and work. Both steps are the right thing to do on moral grounds and they also help boost our economy and the goal of improving postsecondary attainment rates.

Posted by Sara Mead at 10:54 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Some parts of tonight's State of the Union Address sounded awfully familiar to me:

On increasing rates of postsecondary attainment:

2011:

Over the next ten years, nearly half of all new jobs will require education that goes beyond a high school degree. And yet, as many as a quarter of our students aren't even finishing high school. The quality of our math and science education lags behind many other nations. America has fallen to 9th in the proportion of young people with a college degree...... If we take these steps – if we raise expectations for every child, and give them the best possible chance at an education, from the day they're born until the last job they take – we will reach the goal I set two years ago: by the end of the decade, America will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.

2009:

It is our responsibility as lawmakers and educators to make this system work. But it is the responsibility of every citizen to participate in it. And so tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training. This can be community college or a four-year school; vocational training or an apprenticeship. But whatever the training may be, every American will need to get more than a high school diploma. And dropping out of high school is no longer an option. It's not just quitting on yourself, it's quitting on your country - and this country needs and values the talents of every American. That is why we will provide the support necessary for you to complete college and meet a new goal: by 2020, America will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.

On parental responsibility:

2011:

That responsibility begins not in our classrooms, but in our homes and communities. It's family that first instills the love of learning in a child. Only parents can make sure the TV is turned off and homework gets done. We need to teach our kids that it's not just the winner of the Super Bowl who deserves to be celebrated, but the winner of the science fair; that success is not a function of fame or PR, but of hard work and discipline.

2009:

In the end, there is no program or policy that can substitute for a mother or father who will attend those parent/teacher conferences, or help with homework after dinner, or turn off the TV, put away the video games, and read to their child. I speak to you not just as a President, but as a father when I say that responsibility for our children's education must begin at home.

Am I the only person who finds using the (televised) State of the Union to tell parents to turn off the TV ironic?

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Interesting WaPo piece by Richard Whitmire (who has a book coming out on Michelle Rhee) on the desire for "Michelle Lite" reformers who will implement the kind of reforms--teacher evaluation and pay incentives, closing underenrolled and underperforming schools--Rhee did in D.C., but in a nice, kind, touchy-feely way that doesn't p*#s people off. Richard's right in a big picture sense: You can't do things like firing ineffective teachers or closing down schools without upsetting stakeholders, so wanting leaders who will do what needs to be done without provoking political and public angst is like wanting to have your cake and eat it to. But a few caveats worth keeping in mind here:

1. First, there is a tendency among some education reform types to confuse "p*#sing established interests and stakeholders off" with "doing the right thing." Sure, a lot of times doing the right thing makes people mad. But it doesn't follow that making people mad means you're doing the right thing. People can also get mad when you do bad or stupid things! And there's no value in unnecessarily angering people with things that don't get you any substantive ground. One of the issues with Rhee and Fenty was that they did some dumb or tone deaf things--like letting Council members find out about things in the paper--that engendered bad will with influential figures, were totally unnecessary, and didn't really move the ball on things that were important. Would doing things differently on that front have made a difference in November's election? Maybe not. But did some of those things undermine support from figures inclined to support Fenty and Rhee's larger agenda? Yes. As I said here a while back, reform leaders need to be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves, and that means knowing when it's worth making people angry and when to avoid doing so because it ultimately wouldn't move the ball on your big picture goals.

2. Just because you might need a bee eater, a Michelle Genuine Draft, now, to instigate and implement hard reforms, doesn't necessarily mean that's what's necessary over time to sustain and build on those reforms. Hard reforms are disruptive, and maybe they do need to be followed by a gentler and healing touch. The reality is that we haven't had enough experience with truly aggressive reforms in the public education space to really know what needs to come next after all the shouting is done. But at some point we will need to find out.

3. Does Richard (or anyone) really think Kaya Henderson is "Michelle Lite"?

Posted by Sara Mead at 11:38 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Tuesday's State of the Union address has launched a fun game in D.C. education policy and media circles. It goes like this: some folks are reporting breathlessly that the President is going to make education a key theme of the speech, launching a big push to reauthorize ESEA. Then others respond: "that's all well and good, but really, nothing's gonna come of it." Really, it's a very fun game, at least by the standards of what passes for fun in D.C. these days ;)

But we've been down this road before, when President Obama made education a key theme in his 2009 address to the Joint Session of Congress (boring D.C. trivia note: A new president's first SOTU-like speech is not called the State of the Union). So I thought it might be interesting, rather than discussing what might be in tomorrow's speech, to look at what the President said two years ago and what has happened since then. Here's the education section of the 2009 speech:

The third challenge we must address is the urgent need to expand the promise of education in America. [SM note: The first two challenges were energy and health care.]

In a global economy where the most valuable skill you can sell is your knowledge, a good education is no longer just a pathway to opportunity - it is a pre-requisite.
Right now, three-quarters of the fastest-growing occupations require more than a high school diploma. And yet, just over half of our citizens have that level of education. We have one of the highest high school dropout rates of any industrialized nation. And half of the students who begin college never finish.

This is a prescription for economic decline, because we know the countries that out-teach us today will out-compete us tomorrow. That is why it will be the goal of this administration to ensure that every child has access to a complete and competitive education - from the day they are born to the day they begin a career.

Already, we have made an historic investment in education through the economic recovery plan. [SM note: President Obama signed into law the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which included education stimulus funds for K-12 and higher ed, Race to the Top, and the Investing in Innovation program, one week before giving this speech. So the administration's most significant legislation accomplishments in education had already occurred.] We have dramatically expanded early childhood education and will continue to improve its quality, because we know that the most formative learning comes in those first years of life. [SM note: ARRA also included large infusions of funding for Head Start and subsidized child care. Although the administration sought to sustain these increases after ARRA ends, that appears unlikely to happen. The administration's Early Learning Challenge Grant proposal, the part that was supposed to improve early childhood quality, was ultimately jettisoned, leaving little track record of lasting progress on early childhood.] We have made college affordable for nearly seven million more students. [SM note: ARRA included substantial infusions of funding for the Pell grant program, and the health care legislation passed last August also included significant student loan reforms intended, among other things. to make college more affordable. But college costs continue to rise rapidly, and the costs of the Pell grant program have skyrocketed, creating significant long-term challenges for the program and education budgets more broadly.] And we have provided the resources necessary to prevent painful cuts and teacher layoffs that would set back our children's progress. [SM note: Data to date indicates that ARRA was in fact highly effective in preventing teacher layoffs and reducing job losses in the education sector.]

But we know that our schools don't just need more resources. They need more reform. That is why this budget creates new incentives for teacher performance; pathways for advancement, and rewards for success. [SM note: The President's FY2010 budget request included significant increases in funding for the Teacher Incentive Fund (TIF), the final FY2010 budget passed by Congress increased TIF funding from $97.3 million in FY2009 to $400 million in FY2010.] We'll invest in innovative programs that are already helping schools meet high standards and close achievement gaps. [SM note: Investing in Innovation fund, a part of ARRA] And we will expand our commitment to charter schools. [SM note: Federal charter school funding rose from $216 million in FY2009 to $256 million in FY2010.]

It is our responsibility as lawmakers and educators to make this system work. But it is the responsibility of every citizen to participate in it. And so tonight, I ask every American to commit to at least one year or more of higher education or career training. This can be community college or a four-year school; vocational training or an apprenticeship. But whatever the training may be, every American will need to get more than a high school diploma. And dropping out of high school is no longer an option. It's not just quitting on yourself, it's quitting on your country - and this country needs and values the talents of every American. That is why we will provide the support necessary for you to complete college and meet a new goal: by 2020, America will once again have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world. [SM note: Are we on track to achieve this goal? Too soon to say, clearly. High school graduation rates are up slightly, but given that educational enrollments are counter-cyclical, this could be just a reflection of the lousy economy rather than actual progress. Achieving this goal will require more--particularly on the higher education reform side beyond financial aid reforms--than has been done to date.]

I know that the price of tuition is higher than ever, which is why if you are willing to volunteer in your neighborhood or give back to your community or serve your country, we will make sure that you can afford a higher education. And to encourage a renewed spirit of national service for this and future generations, I ask this Congress to send me the bipartisan legislation that bears the name of Senator Orrin Hatch as well as an American who has never stopped asking what he can do for his country - Senator Edward Kennedy. [SM note: The Hatch-Kennedy Serve America Act was signed into law in April 2009.]

These education policies will open the doors of opportunity for our children. But it is up to us to ensure they walk through them. In the end, there is no program or policy that can substitute for a mother or father who will attend those parent/teacher conferences, or help with homework after dinner, or turn off the TV, put away the video games, and read to their child. I speak to you not just as a President, but as a father when I say that responsibility for our children's education must begin at home.

Did the administration achieve the goals set out in the 2009 speech? It's a bit of a strange question, since ARRA, which included the administration's most significant education accomplishments, had already been signed into law. How will this year's speech compare to 2009 on education?

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Today is Martin Luther King Day, a holiday that always makes me a little bit uncomfortable. Not because I have anything but the utmost respect for King and work challenging racial and economic injustice. But because I respect him too much to be comfortable with much of how we "honor" his legacy this day.

Too often the Martin Luther King, Jr., who is lionized in our public discourse is sanitized, soft, and fuzzy, a secularized saint rather than a real man whose battle for racial and economic justice was, while nonviolent, still deeply disruptive to existing privileges and power structures and inherently political. This watered-down version of King denies the full power of his life and work while also allowing us today to feel better about ourselves than we ought. And our public schools are highly complicit in conveying this soft and fuzzy King to our children.

I'm particularly uncomfortable with the decision to make King's holiday a "day of service," on which young people are encouraged to engage in service projects. Not that there's anything wrong with any of these projects. They're nice things to do. But the progress of the civil rights movement didn't come from people working in soup kitchens, cleaning up parks, or doing similarly nice, service-y things. It came from people nonviolently but directly standing up to unjust power structures and engaging in civil disobedience. People actually broke unjust laws--and got arrested for it. Teaching our kids that this is a day about service seems to get the message dead wrong--or at least to suggest that our nation and world are no longer plagued by injustices that require more than volunteer work to right them.

But, in fact, plenty of injustice still exists in our nation and world today. Many of us who work in education reform are convinced that our existing educational system is complicit in perpetuating serious racial and economic injustices. But there's a temptation to seek to address this without upsetting any existing apple carts of power or privilege. We see this in education reform strategies that focus on more money or new programs without seeking to address the fundamental dysfunctions of our education system (we also see it among reform-y types who are unwilling to admit that some necessary reforms might require additional resources or politically dicey reallocations of resources from haves to have-nots). We've also seen it among some charter school operators and other education entrepreneurs who have sought to create effective programs in small pockets of safety but have been reluctant to get their hands dirty in dealing with education reform politics. We even see it among education policy wonks and foundations who believe we can address injustice by persuading those who currently hold power to change, rather than tackling power head-on and building alternative power bases that empower parents, children, and others who are currently disenfranchised in our public discourse. I see signs, though, that this is starting to change, in the emergence of various groups engaged in grassroots organizing and political activism around education reform. Are any of these efforts really going to build a base of empowered parents? Are they going to tackle serious inequities and pose a real threat to existing power structures? And will the ultimate results be good for the kids our education system has long failed? I don't know. But I'm at least glad that people are beginning to think seriously in this way.

Posted by Sara Mead at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Two very different sets of state rankings are out this week. The big one is Ed Week's (do I really need to disclose that they're hosting my blog?) annual Quality Counts report, which includes the usual state-by-state highlights and rankings, as well as special reports honing in on how the education impacts of state budget crunches. Rick Hess should be especially pleased that one of these stories looks at the need to and challenges of reigning in growth in personnel costs, and another looks at achieving efficiencies in special education. There's also good news around increased coordination and better transitions between early childhood and the K-12 public school system, although the indicators here remain blunt.

A second, and very different, set of rankings is the Center for Education Reform's annual ranking of state charter school laws. I have my quibbles with them, and other rankings have emerged recently that I like better, but CER's rankings remain a useful source of information on charter laws, they're generally right about who's at the top and bottom of the spectrum here, and their big-picture conclusion about the crapitude of many state charter school laws (which support neither supply, flexibility, nor quality) is dead on.

Not surprisingly, the states at the top and bottom of these two rankings are very different. Discuss as you will.

Posted by Sara Mead at 12:00 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Judging from my RSS and twitter feeds today, everyone can't stop talking about Amy Chua's WSJ essay this weekend on "Chinese mothers"--and it's a doozy of the genre, ripe with anecdotes and thin on data, primarily fixated on the concerns and experience of educated professionals, and seemingly designed to prey on parental guilt and feelings of inadequacy (which, give Chua credit, is at least consistent with the broader theme of the piece).

This drives me a little nuts. Not the article, so much as the conversation about it. For starters, Chua's trafficking in a view of American parenting that seems to be solely informed by well-educated professional parents (see Annette Lareau's Unequal Childhoods for examples of how lots of American parents aren't nearly as concerned about their children's individuality or self-esteem as Chua suggests). More fundamentally, what really gets me is that, there is, you know, actual research on parenting styles and effective parenting, and the impacts that different levels of restrictiveness/permissivity have on children's outcomes. But, when it comes to parenting, it's way more fun to talk in terms of anecdote, sterotypes, and generalized "shoulds" that leave out key nuances than it is to actually look at the research.

I'm not an expert on the parenting research--I probably know just enough about it to be a danger to myself and others--so I'm going to tread carefully here. But, what seems particularly dangerous about Chua's piece, in view of the research here, is her postulation of parenting as being on some kind of either/or 2 dimensional continuum from "restrictive" or "mean" to "permissive" and "nurturing." Any one who's at all familiar with the research on parenting styles, or just has a lick of common sense, knows it's more complicated than that. Some parents are both emotionally nurturing and permissive in the way Chua describes American parents as being (a parenting style researchers have described as permissive), and some parents are very demanding, restrictive, and not emotionally responsive or nurturing to their children (a parenting style researchers have described as authoritarian), as Chua seems to suggest Chinese parents are. But these things don't always go together. It's entirely possible for parents to be simultaneously emotionally nurturing and supportive AND to impose critical structure and demands on their children (researchers call this authoritative parenting). In fact, research tends to indicate better outcomes for children whose parents are both demanding and nurturing.

Indeed, Chua's own article seems to suggest some of this:

Once when I was young--maybe more than once--when I was extremely disrespectful to my mother, my father angrily called me "garbage" in our native Hokkien dialect. It worked really well. I felt terrible and deeply ashamed of what I had done. But it didn't damage my self-esteem or anything like that. I knew exactly how highly he thought of me. I didn't actually think I was worthless or feel like a piece of garbage.

Chua suggests that it was ok for her father to call her garbage because she was secure in the knowledge that he valued her and didn't actually think she was worthless. But if her parents really were totally disinterested in her emotional development, she wouldn't have had that security. In other words, this stuff is more complicated.

What does any of this have to do with education? Well, for starters, parenting is, if anything, an area where media reports and public debate are even less informed by research--and shabby in how it is handled when it does come up--than education. Which is saying a lot given the state of debate in education! Second, people talk a lot in education debates about the importance of parents, but a lot of those conversations traffic in vague cliches about the importance of parents, rather than dealing seriously with questions about what good parenting actually means and what educators and policymakers can do to encourage and support parents to behave in ways that encourage good child outcomes. Give Chua credit at least for being willing to go there in some sense. Third, research indicates that there are some similarities between what we know about effective parenting and what we know about effective teaching. Just as kids do better when their parents are both emotionally nurturing but also provide structure and demands, kids also tend to do better when their teachers are both emotionally supportive and instructionally demanding.

Posted by Sara Mead at 2:50 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Tom Vander Ark's recent post about the idea of using "merit badges" to create a more customized educational experience is well-worth checking out. Vander Ark is focusing on K-12 education, but the needs in higher education seem even greater, given the diversity of needs and skill levels with which people come to the higher ed system. Conversations about increasing postsecondary attainment to restore and maintain our global lead here ought to acknowledge that this probably can't be done just by pushing more people through an existing system that has a really crappy track record serving low-income, minority, and non-traditional students. We need new and more diverse forms here that are customized to students' pre-existing skill levels and needs, indicate real skills, are respected by employers, and translate into meaningful employment and advancement opportunities. I've been thinking about this a lot lately in the context of the ongoing debate about increasing education and skill levels of early childhood educators--stay tuned for more on that.

I also appreciate Vander Ark's points about high school here. For all the talk about high school reform, the reality is that high school today is still primarily about obtaining a certain number of Carnegie Units based on butt time in seats, rather than what students know and can do. While much needed, reform efforts to improve high school rigor have tended to focus on ensuring students acquire those Carnegie Units in certain areas--but have not questioned the underlying system here.

Last week's NYT article about the Concord Review and the decline of high school research papers offers a good illustration of why this is problematic. American kids are completing more "rigorous" course titles, but that doesn't mean they're writing research papers or acquiring critical writing skills. I'm proud that my sister, a high school English teacher, still demands that her students write research papers--even though doing so requires a tremendous time commitment and personal sacrifice on her part that she's in no way compensated for--a big reason, of course, that many teachers don't assign research papers. I love the idea of a "Merit Badge" for completing a research paper--especially combined with more flexible compensation schemes that would reward teachers for the added work involved in supervising students in writing such papers (just suggesting one way better compensation schemes for teachers should be about so much more than tying pay to test scores).

Posted by Sara Mead at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

The Post's Conor Williams has a good piece looking in further detail at the school reform situation in D.C. and why the election of Vincent Gray as Mayor is not the catastrophe for D.C. ed reform many national voices assumed it was. Williams particularly highlights Gray's selection of Hosanna Mahaley as State Superintendent (the person who runs the office that carries out state-level education functions for D.C.), a role some folks expect to become more important under Gray and given D.C.'s Race to the Top win; DeShawn Wright as Deputy Mayor for Education; and decision to keep former Chancellor Rhee's deputy, Kaya Henderson, on as interim chancellor.

I'd agree that those are all good signs. What Williams overlooks is Gray's support for charter schools, which educate nearly 40 percent of the District's students and are an important part of the educational landscape here. Conor--as you and your wife consider whether or not to buy a home in D.C. (and I hope you do!), don't forget to take into account the charter school options here--something, along with widespread access to publicly funded pre-k, that D.C. can offer parents and neighboring Maryland and Virginia suburbs can't. (disc: I'm on the District of Columbia Public Charter School Board, which authorizes charter schools in D.C.)

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Last night the D.C. Democratic State Committee selected Sekou Biddle as interim At-Large Council Member, filling the vacancy created by former At-Large Member Kwame Brown's election as Council Chair in November. Biddle will fill the seat until an April special election, which folks who know D.C. politics better than I say he now has a good shot at winning. Brown has already endorsed Biddle for the seat, and Mayor Vincent Gray has kinda-sorta-indicated support without actually giving an endorsement. (If you, like me, find this process utterly confusing and ugly, blame D.C.'s Congressional overlords for the goofy home rule arrangements they've created.)

The selection of Biddle, a member of the D.C. State Board of Education whose reform credentials include stints with Jumpstart, KIPP, and Teach for America, is good news for D.C. ed reform. More importantly, it's a reminder that there's a real depth of ed reform energy in D.C. that people outside the District shouldn't write off just because Michelle Rhee is gone.

Posted by Sara Mead at 3:33 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

I've spent this week on the blog arguing that we should regard publicly funded pre-k as a structural arrangement, rather than a specific instructional intervention. This has implications for how we think about pre-k research, but it also has broader implications for how policy debates address pre-k.

Current policy debates frequently address pre-k as a specific intervention or program. We ask whether or not pre-k "works." We talk about "state pre-k programs" and "the federal Head Start program." Conversations about pre-k as an intervention or program can have a kind of "just add water" feel: If we can just convince the public to spend enough money on pre-k, if we mandate small class sizes and certified, bachelor's degreed teachers (and maybe also curriculum), then we'll get high-quality pre-k that produces good results for kids and those famous $7-to-$1 returns on public investment. And if we were talking about a specific, replicable intervention, that would be fine.

But if we're really talking about universal pre-k, we're talking about something bigger than a program or specific intervention. We're talking about a whole new system of public education for 4- (and perhaps 3-)year-olds. And that means the policy debate needs to expand beyond "does this program work?" and "what should this program look like?" to ask how we can structure high-quality educational systems that produces the best outcomes for young children. That means asking questions like: How can educational systems incorporate diverse providers and ensure quality across them? How should we hold providers accountable for their outcomes? How do we ensure that the system provides provide meaningful quality options for parents and children? How do we develop the pipeline of human capital for the system and the right incentives to deploy talent strategically? How can a pre-k system foster innovation, continuous improvement, and improved productivity? How can we create the right set of incentives for all the adults in the system? Among other things.

It's one thing--admittedly a very big thing--to persuade policymakers and the public to invest in pre-k programs. But if we want to ensure that these investments produce the desired outcomes for children and are sustainable over time, we also need to build a robust pre-k system. Pre-k advocates know this, and in fact the states with the most robust and high-quality pre-k programs have dealt with many of these system and structural issues. But that's not reflected in the national policy conversation.

The exciting thing here for K-12 analysts and reformers should be that the need to build new systems to deliver public education for preschoolers creates an opportunity to demonstrate how reform-oriented ideas can enable these new pre-k systems to avoid some of the shortcomings of the current K-12 system. The danger, of course, is that these new systems will simply extend K-12 shortcomings downward. That's why K-12 reformers need to pay more attention to debates about pre-k, and also why pre-k advocates need to pay more attention to the lessons of K-12 reform debates. The first step, though, is to stop thinking and talking about pre-k as an intervention or program, and start thinking about it as a set of structural and systemic arrangements to improve the education of preschoolers.

Posted by Sara Mead at 8:32 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

So the CW in Washington these days is that early ed issues are "out" (in the words of eduflack Patrick Riccards) and that, with early ed advocates having lost key battles in 2010, and the incoming Tea Party Congress no fan of guv'mint-funded early childhood programs, nobody should expect much action on early ed in 2011.

Not so fast! Says my former New America colleague Lisa Guernsey, who proffers up a list of 6 "hot spots" for federal action on early childhood this year. Some of these are areas where early childhood supporters will be on the defense (ie, maintaining early childhood program funding), but there are also opportunities for progress in areas where early childhood concerns are integrated with broader K-12 policy debates (ie, teacher effectiveness), or where the administration has the authority or responsibility to act on its own (ie, Head Start re-compete). Check out the full list.

I'm particularly interested in two issues Lisa raises: The early childhood implications of broader conversations about reforming the tax code (which ought not be separated from this debate about tax credits for home schoolers), as well as Head Start re-compete. Head Start re-compete seems like the sort of thing that incoming conservatives out to support, since they've been critical of Head Start quality and the re-compete should enhance accountability and competition in the Head Start program--principles conservatives generally like in education. But I'm curious where the new Congressional conservatives will come down when (and if) the Obama administration actually starts pulling Head Start contracts from underperforming providers. Will they stand by their values and support Head Start recompetition? Or will they cynically seize on any potential opportunities to criticize the administration here (Is "get your Washington hands off my local Head Start provider" going to be a new "I don't want government messing with my Medicare?")? Or will conservatives members' responses here be swayed by the parochial interests of their local Head Start grantees--some of whom are quite politically powerful? Stay tuned to see. And you thought early childhood was going to be boring this year!?!

Posted by Sara Mead at 11:58 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Yesterday, I explained that I don't think it makes sense to think and talk about the evidence on pre-k in the same way that we think and talk about the evidence on specific instructional and pedagogical innovations.

Instead, I'd suggest that the body of evidence for pre-k is more comparable to the body of evidence on charter schools. In both areas, we have a strong body of evidence that specific models--such as the High/Scope Perry Preschool and the KIPP network of charter schools--"work." But we also have evidence showing that the broader range of early childhood or charter school operators are something of a mixed bag. When it comes to charter schools, a recent study by the Center for Research on Education Outcomes (CREDO) at Stanford found that only 17 percent of charter schools nationally outperformed their district school peers, 37 percent did worse, and the remainder were about on par with their district peers. When we look at the larger body of evidence on publicly funded preschool, we see similarly mixed results. While there is evidence that large scale state pre-k programs in New Jersey, Tulsa, and New Mexico are producing benefits, these programs are not identical with one another or with pre-k programs in other states. Further, in at least New Jersey, which I know the most about, there is variation in quality among different pre-k providers even as the program overall produces positive results. National studies of state pre-k programs have found low levels of average instructional quality across these programs. We also need to take into account the disappointing results from the Head Start impact study, which found that, although Head Start does produce learning gains for participating youngsters, these gains disappear a few years after children enter school.

Now, does admitting that there is some mixed evidence here discredit the value of charter schooling or pre-k as a strategy to improve educational outcomes? NO! Why? Because charter schooling and publicly funded pre-kindergarten are both ultimately structural reforms that expand the boundaries of public education and create new spaces and opportunities for educators to serve children. Charter schools do this by allowing organizations other than school districts to operate public schools. Publicly funded pre-k does this by allowing districts and early childhood providers--both existing and new--to receive public funds to serve 4-year-olds. The organizations that fill these spaces and take advantage of those opportunities will vary in quality, with some providing high-quality services and others not.

The question, then, becomes not whether pre-k or charter schools "work." Rather, once you decide--based on a variety of types of evidence, including empirical research and theory--that allowing innovation and choice in public education, or providing education to 4-year-olds is a desirable thing to do: How do you design structural arrangements so as to maximize the number and reach of the highest-quality providers, and minimize the number of low-quality providers? I'll close this series out tomorrow by talking a little bit more about that, and why the issue of whether pre-k is a specific intervention or a structural approach has policy implications that extend beyond how we talk about research.

First, though, two caveats to the above discussion: (1) The discussion about pre-k is different from the discussion about charter schools in that charter schools in most places offer an alternative to an existing public education system that, while often producing suboptimal outcomes does in fact offer universal access to educational services to all children. That's not true in pre-k, where significant numbers of children, particularly low- and moderate-income children, are not getting any early childhood education services at all. There is an argument, which Jens Ludwig and Deborah Phillips make compellingly here, that simply extending early childhood services to poor children who do not currently receive them can carry benefits for those children even if those services are not particularly good. This does not mean, though, that we should not try to ensure that we do not design pre-k arrangements to be as efficient and effective as possible in serving children given existing resource constraints. (2) There is evidence that the level of resources and quality of inputs in many settings where young children are currently served is simply too low to meet even very basic conditions for quality. To the extent this is the case, simply increasing resources or raising standards for inputs may produce improvements in quality and child outcomes--and is probably necessary to do so. Individuals who approach pre-k debates from a K-12 reform perspective and fail to understand this reality risk looking foolish. Again, though, we should seek to ensure that efforts to increase resources and/or raise input standards in pre-k settings are done in the most efficient and effective ways possible.

Posted by Sara Mead at 9:48 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Readers interested in either the i3 grant program or in literacy instruction should check out Nick Anderson's Washington Post article from the weekend on Success for All, as well as this excellent and interesting follow-up blog post that reminds me why I so like Jay Mathews. I think that the awarding of major i3 "scale-up" grants to two long-running literacy interventions--Success for All and Reading Recovery--that had previously been largely shut out of the federal Reading First program remains one of the most interesting and overlooked stories of 2010. (overlooked largely, I'd guess, because too few folks in the education media or reform crowds are really all that interested in instruction, and those who are, are sick of the "reading wars."--but Anderson's and Mathews' articles offer good steps to address that oversight) The real outcome of this story and the i3 grants generally is of course only just starting to be seen, so saavy ed-watchers should stay tuned to this story in 2011.

One other note: At the time the i3 grants were announced, some critics snarked about the "old school"-ness of scale-up grantees SFA and Reading Recovery, a sentiment that gets echoed a bit in Anderson's piece (although without the negative judgement). It shows how dumb and uninformed this critique is, that SFA was one of the first ventures funded by New Schools Venture Fund, which is typically viewed as sort of the epitome of social entrepreneurial innovation in education. 3 of the 4 scale-up winners (KIPP, TFA, and SFA) have been beneficiaries of NSVF Funding.

Posted by Sara Mead at 12:15 PM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

As I wrote yesterday, whether we think about preschool as a specific intervention or a structural arrangement has significant implications for how we think and talk about pre-k research--as well as pre-kindergarten more generally.

Universal pre-k advocates, by and large, talk about pre-kindergarten as if it were a specific type of instructional intervention. For example, Pre-K Now's Marci Young recently wrote:

There's an education reform strategy that has 50 years of solid research behind it, with proven results that demonstrate how to improve student achievement...It's an investment proven to yield up to $7 for every public dollar invested, paying dividends to families, school districts and taxpayers. It's voluntary, high-quality pre-kindergarten.

But is this really the right frame to talk and think about pre-k research? I don't really think so. To be sure, much of the body of research on pre-k impacts comes from evaluations of the effectiveness of specific interventions. We have randomized-controlled trials showing that the High/Scope Perry Preschool Program, the Abecedarian Project, and the Chicago Child Parent Centers interventions were effective in improving educational and life outcomes for the low-income students they served. We also have rigorous regression discontinuity designed studies showing that the approaches taken by Tulsa's Universal Pre-K Program and New Jersey's Abbott Pre-K Program produce learning gains for participating students.

But Universal Pre-K advocates are not, by and large, proposing to replicate the specific High/Scope, Abecedarian, CPC, or Tulsa models. Rather, what they're proposing is a structural innovation--the provision of public funding for pre-kindergarten. Granted, these groups also advocate that pre-k funding be accompanied by specific quality requirements, such as bachelor's degreed and certified teachers and small class sizes, that seek to replicate some of the qualities of demonstrated effective pre-k programs. But these are still largely structural characteristics, and advocating for them is not the same as advocating for the explicit replication of demonstrated effective models.

What does this mean for how we should think and talk about pre-k research? More on that tomorrow.

(Btw, yesterday's title quote was from Mark Twain.)

Posted by Sara Mead at 11:33 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend

Recent blog posts on pre-kindergarten by Kevin Carey and myself have generated some questions and comment from individuals who believe Kevin and I are challenging or attempting to dismiss the evidence on the effectiveness of pre-kindergarten programs. Not at all--the body of evidence demonstrating that children can benefit from high-quality pre-kindergarten programs is one of the most robust in education policy.

But I do think the feedback I've received, as well as some of the arguments put forward by prominent pre-k advocates, do raise some important issues about how it's appropriate to think about certain types of evidence in education policy debates, and specifically how it's appropriate to think about the evidence on the effectiveness of pre-k programs.

As my fellow Ed Week blogger Rick Hess has written previously, there are different types of questions in education policy that we might seek evidence to address. One sort of question involves the efficacy (or lack thereof) of specific interventions and pedagogical strategies: ie, Does a specific early literacy intervention produce improvements in children's literacy skills? Is one math curriculum more effective than another? Does a specific coaching intervention produce improvements in teacher's instructional practice? etc. These types of questions are best addressed through randomized controlled trials and other designs that seek to determine whether or not a particular intervention or strategy "works."

But educational policy debates frequently focus on different types of questions, regarding how different structural arrangements affect educational productivity, quality, or outcomes ie, What happens when we allow different types of organizations other than school districts to operate public schools? What happens when we expand educational choices available to parents? What happens when we compensate teachers based on on-the-job performance, rather than credentials and experience (and what are the pros and cons of different models of doing that?)? These questions can certainly be addressed through empirical research, but they are not really amenable to the same type of "does it work" questions or the associated research designs as used to evaluate specific instructional interventions.

This raises the question: Is publicly funded preschool a specific intervention, or a structural arrangement? How we answer this question shapes how we should talk about research and evidence in pre-k. Tomorrow I'll write more about how I think we should answer this question.

(Bonus points to anyone who can tell me who the title quote to this post comes from.)

Posted by Sara Mead at 8:48 AM | Permalink | Leave a comment | Recommend