April 1, 2103--Wobegon Indeed

From George W. Bush's No Child Left Behind to Barack Obama's Race to the Top, federal attempts to catalyze education reform have been based on one set of assumptions--raise standards for all; test students to see if  progress is being made; and, if not, take remedial action.

That remedial action involves penalizing individual schools that fail to foster academic achievement for all students (including closing them down); not allowing federal money to be deployed to those schools; and, more radically, dismiss teachers who do not perform effectively.

Though federal funds constitute only about two percent of what is spent on public education, that two percent amounts to real money. Hundreds of millions in New York State alone. So educators have been attempting to respond to federal guidelines and pressures so that they can get their hands on the money.

Somehow I was invited to be at the bill signing for No Child Left Behind. I sat next to Margaret Spellings, a close divisor to President Bush who in his second tern became Secretary of Education. She's was and is a good person and decent educator. While waiting for the president to arrive I told her I supported both the intention and details of the legislation--to reduce the achievement gap between low-income and affluent students. So did Senator Ted Kennedy who sponsored it in the Senate.  But, I added, as soon as it was signed and became law, educators all over the country would work harder to undermine it than implement it.

She looked incredulous since she behind the scenes was more the author of the legislation than either the president or the Congress. "What do you mean?"

I said, "That as long as rewards and punishments are involved in parceling out the dollars they will find a way to scam the system."

"You mean cheat?"

"That's another way of putting it."

"Who will?"

"State education chiefs, school superintendents, principals, and individual teachers."

"By doing what? Give me an example?"

I told her that as long as boosting high school graduation rates remains a goal and those educators who do best will be rewarded in various ways, school officials will expend more effort to find ways to jigger the definition of graduation rate than improving instruction. For example, rather than seeing how many 9th graders attain high school diplomas in four years they will see how many who enter the 12th grade graduate 10 months later.

And, I added, as long as student progress at the elementary school level is measured by standardized tests, though the goal is to raise standards and push everyone to do better, what we will in fact see is that most places will lower standards to make it appear that student achievement is improving.

The rest in regard to NCLB is history and very much in the headlines now that the former school superintendent in Atlanta, Beverly Hall, has been indicted along with dozens of teachers and principals, for widespread cheating on student achievement tests. It is alleged that Dr. Hall benefited personally as her employment contract stipulated she would receive hundreds of thousands of dollars in bonuses if student test scores improved. As did individual teachers receive money above their salaries if their kids did better.

With Race to the Top, the Obama initiative, sights were turned even more directly on teachers. For states to receive Race dollars, they had to work out new, more rigorous evaluation standards for teachers.   Including provisions to remove those who were repeatedly shown to be ineffective. This was needed, it was argued, since it is a very rare occurrence for even one teacher to be removed for poor performance. This in spite of the fact that tens of millions of public school students were falling further and further behind.

So, to get the federal dollars, most states came up with tougher methods to supervise teachers. At least on paper.

We are now sadly learning that states and individual school districts did the very same thing they did to get around the requirements of No Child Left Behind--they lowered standards so very few teachers, as in the past, would be held accountable.

For example, in Leon County, Florida, one courageous school principle was willing to go on record in the New York Times about how the system has been re-rigged.

Melissa Fullmore, principal of Ruediger Elementary School in Tallahassee, confessed that only one or two of her teachers would have been deemed "highly effective," the top category in the state's teacher-evaluation system. Three would have been marked "needs improvement" (one up from the bottom), and the rest would have been considered merely "effective."

But in her school--and the percentages are replicated statewide--all but one were scored to be "highly effective" and the other was classified "effective."

Because the bar on teaching effectiveness is set so low in Florida (and once again in most states), she is quoted as saying, "I wouldn't put stock in the numbers."

In a nearby school, Springwood Elementary, prior to lowering standards, three or four were judged to "need improvement," whereas afterwards, all were bumped up to "effective."

In this woe-begotten situation, clearly everyone is well above average. If only.